Chelsea Handler On Twitter: Seems To Call For A Military Coup Against Donald Trump
Comedian and former late night talk show host Chelsea Handler took to Twitter this week with what looks like a suggestion for the nation’s military leaders to remove Donald Trump from the presidency. She underscored the suggestion with the comment that the generals would be judged negatively by history should they allow the Trump administration to continue.
Handler’s Twitter comment was quickly met with derision — with some calling her out for treasonous remarks.
Rare reported Friday (August 11) that Chelsea Handler offered up a tweet that some are suggesting calls for a military coup against President Trump. She posted: “To all the generals surrounding our idiot-in-chief…the longer U wait to remove him, the longer UR name will appear negatively in history.”
It is unclear why Handler is of the impression that generals should remove a sitting democratically elected president from office (or have the right to do so), nor has she elaborated on her post. Regardless of her reasoning, Twitter users had no problem condemning the comedian’s remarks for what they seemingly invoke — a military coup.
One user, in particular, Carmine Sabia, posted, “Do you comprehend that you have called for the military to overthrow the government? Treason. Because you cannot get over an election.”
To all the generals surrounding our idiot-in-chief…the longer U wait to remove him, the longer UR name will appear negatively in history.
— Chelsea Handler (@chelseahandler) August 11, 2017
Do you comprehend that you have called for the military to overthrow the government? Treason. Because you cannot get over an election.
— Carmine Sabia (@CarmineSabia) August 11, 2017
But Chelsea Handler does not stand alone in this kind of thinking. Comedian Sarah Silverman seemed to call for the same type of ousting of President Trump less than two weeks after his inauguration.
Also taking to Twitter, Silverman wrote, “WAKE UP & JOIN THE RESISTANCE. ONCE THE MILITARY IS W US FASCISTS GET OVERTHROWN. MAD KING & HIS HANDLERS GO BYE BYE.”
After a day of intense backlash for her all-caps comment, Silverman backtracked, posting that “FEAR” had motivated her to call for violence.
“FEAR can motivate even peacenik snowflakes 2 incite violence & last night I felt it hard,” she wrote. “Trying 2 keep in check bc damnit I love u America.”
But Silverman wasn’t the first celebrity to make headlines for inflammatory language against President Trump. Singer Madonna, speaking in Washington, D.C., at the Women’s March the day after the inauguration, said, “Yes, I’m angry. Yes, I am outraged. Yes, I have thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House. But I know that this won’t change anything. We cannot fall into despair. As the poet W.H. Auden once wrote on the eve of World War II, we must love one another or die. I choose love.”
As the uproar grew over her comments, including a suggestion from Fox News Channel’s Fox & Friends” that Madonna be arrested, the singer, according to the Los Angeles Times, said that her comments were taken out of context.
“[I]t’s important people hear and understand my speech in its entirety rather than one phrase taken wildly out of context,” she posted to Instagram the day following the speech.
And yet, as to Chelsea Handler’s Twitter post, there are those that are attempting to ameliorate the military coup aspect of the tweet by pointing out that the comedian might have ham-handedly voiced the desire for the Cabinet, which has just one general currently emplaced — retired Gen. James Mattis, to move to remove Trump from the presidency via the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
After one user clearly misreads Handler’s post and posts that she is “advocating and supporting the assassination of the President of the United States,” which Handler clearly does not do (she actually calls for “the generals” to “remove him” and did not in any way mention assassination), another poster followed up with the idea of invoking the 25th Amendment.
In all seriousness they are suggesting invoking #25thAmendmentNOW
Clearly he is unable to discharge his duties— Mike Larkin (@SafetyOne) August 11, 2017
As mentioned, Chelsea Handler has yet to elaborate or offer an explanation for her Friday tweet.
[Featured Image by Joshua Blanchard/Getty Images]
