During Monday’s monologue for “Jimmy Kimmel Live!,” the comedian weighed in on the situation in Siberia, which saw a 28-year-old laboratory worker at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Institute die of severe pneumonia. Dozens more are currently in quarantine.

“We took 200 members of our staff to Brooklyn. I am pleased to announce that only half of them came back with the flu,” Kimmel said. “Everyone is out sick. Everybody is sick today. Although, I guess we’re lucky to just have the flu.”

He added: “You know, today the governor of New York declared a state disaster emergency because of a measles outbreak there. So now we’ve got the flu, we’ve got measles, we’ve got rabies, we’ve got West Nile virus, we have flea-born typhus, all on the rise. And now we are hearing that in Russia there has been at least one death from a suspected case of the plague, the pneumonic plague.”

After mentioning that around 200 people are in quarantine, Kimmel said of the White House’s response: “The White House says they are monitoring the situation and assessing options to figure out if there is any way they can make money off of it.”

“Jimmy Kimmel Live!” editors then played footage of Trump answering questions about the supposed plague, with the president noting that “we’ll help them.”

“Well, everybody, they’ll help [them],” Kimmel responded. “No worries. The gang who brought polio back is on the case.”

“So, this outbreak, which is scary, is reported to have originated with a lab leak at the Anti-Plague Institute of Siberia,” he added. “Which sounds like the plot of one of those horror movies you can only get on Tubi.”

Before moving on, Kimmel sarcastically noted that he felt “glad we have a president who is a doctor and also Jesus,” poking fun at Trump’s past AI-generated religious memes.

For Kimmel’s full monologue, watch the video above. A representative for the White House did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.

“Jimmy Kimmel Live!” airs weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET on ABC.

The post Jimmy Kimmel Mocks Trump’s Promise to Help Russia Amid Siberia Plague: ‘The Gang Who Brought Polio Back’ appeared first on TheWrap.

Bakker’s wife, Lori, confirmed his passing in a statement shared to the Instagram account belonging to his show, “The Jim Bakker Show.” His cause of death was not immediately revealed.

“It is with a broken heart that I share that my beloved husband, Jim Bakker, went home to be with the Lord this evening,” Lori wrote alongside a photo of the TV minister. “For 66 years, Jim gave his life to preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He was a pioneer of Christian television, but to me, he was my husband, my best friend, and the man I was honored to walk beside through so many seasons of life and ministry.”

She added: “Jim loved people deeply. He loved this ministry, and he loved the friends and partners who stood with him throughout the years. Even in his final days, his heart was still for the work of God and for the Gospel to continue reaching the world.”

As Lori went on, she noted that their family was grieving and asked for privacy.

“Jim finished his race with faith,” she concluded. “His voice, his vision and his legacy will never be forgotten.”

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In 1974, Bakker, along with his first wife, the aforementioned Tammy Faye, founded the Christian television program, “The PTL Club.” The enterprise later grew into a religious broadcast empire, which included their theme park, Heritage USA. However, the couple’s success came to a halt when it was discovered that Jim had been using church funds for his personal benefit.

In 1988, Bakker was indicted on 24 federal counts, including mail and wire fraud and conspiring to defraud the public. He was also accused of drugging and raping church secretary Jessica Hahn alongside “PTL Club” co-host John Wesley Fletcher. Bakker maintained that the encounter with Hahn was a consensual one while being accused of using $279,000 church funds to pay her off.

The next year, he was found guilty on all counts after a five-week trial.

While he was originally sentenced to 45 years in prison, his sentence was reduced and he was released in 1994 after only serving five years. During Bakker’s incarceration, Tammy Faye divorced him, going on to marry Roe Messner in 1992. Bakker remarried in 1998, wedding Lori Beth Graham, with whom he adopted five children.

Jim and Tammy Faye shared son Jay and daughter Tammy Sue. The couple was portrayed by Andrew Garfield and Jessica Chastain, respectively, in 2021’s “The Eyes of Tammy Faye.”

The post Jim Bakker, Controversial Televangelist and Ex-Husband of Tammy Faye Bakker, Dies at 86 appeared first on TheWrap.

The fact that Guadagnino and his collaborators have made a film that pulses with humanity, one whose craft acts as an antithesis to the love for algorithms and technology its characters espouse, is its clever sleight of hand. This film may be the world’s obituary, but in its thrilling, creative and provocative telling, it also reminds exactly what makes human beings – and their art, specifically – special. Hopefully, this is a film that can be more than a reminder of all that we might lose. 

In regards to the proliferation of AI in our lives and what super intelligence might mean for the paradigm of the world, I do not think we need to be told to be afraid. “Artificial” gives a new dimension to that fear, moving away from the abstract nature of doomsday and fastening something more tangible and, therefore, more terrifying. Guadagnino’s film is disarmingly funny in the way he critiques figures like Dario Amodei, Elon Musk and Altman, but just the same, he complicates our ability to laugh too much because what unfolds is not in the far past. These people are alive today, time having sharpened their worst impulses into blades they have pierced the whole world with. They wanted to shape and sculpt the world into their image back then but lacked the resources to make their fantasies reality. Now, it is technology that has to catch up to their twisted dreams.

Part of the film’s tragic register is the way that Simon Rich’s script goes to painstaking lengths to show the good intentions from which our present hellscape has sprung. When we meet Ilya Sutskever (Yura Borisov) in 2003, he’s an eccentric, eager, prodigy incapable of lying, whose passion for creating artificial superintelligence is only matched by his desire to create standing desks out of Pringles, toilet paper and desk drawers. He works with Toronto University professor Geoffrey Hinton (Mark Rylance) and their early years are rooted in a genuine sense of discovery and curiosity. The two join Google, but once Altman (Andrew Garfield) and Elon Musk (Ike Barinholtz) catch wind of what Sutskever is building, they recruit him to join their team. Sutskever, guided myopically by the genuine belief that power computer programs can end world problems around hunger, illness and even death, fails to see the devils he is getting into bed with.

While you are unlikely to leave “Artificial” unaware of who the villains are, Guadagnino resists easy judgment and refrains from leveling aspersions only at those who are more overt about their vices. Borisov, tender, delicate and sensitive, expertly plays Sutskever’s crystal clear ambitions as his greatest strength and weakness. He is so pure in his pursuit of research, so unwavering in his belief in artificial intelligence’s messianic powers, that he is resistant to a more measured and patient timeline of development.

“Have you ever considered the link between knowledge and patience?” Hinton tells him in their very first meeting. The tragedy of course, is that Sutskever learns, but only when he sees the people around him, like Altman and Musk, driven by the spirit to be first at the cost of being ethical. It is in this way, that “Artificial” avoids the trap of being outdated by nestling its anxieties in timeless tensions, in the battles between progress and accountability, calm and speed, restraint and hunger. What we see is not just history being retold, but myth being made. 

Indeed, does knowing the serpent’s motives beforehand make the desecration of a garden of Eden go down any easier? That is the tribulation Sutskever faces when Altman takes off the demure wool to reveal the predator underneath, and as a foil to the earnest, unshakeable idealism that Borisov imbues his performance with, Garfield’s is mesmerizing to watch. The actor perfectly captures what makes Altman so charismatic and alluring, and Garfield plays up how the entrepreneur was a master of seduction in all respects. Altman frequently grabs people at the nape of their neck, bringing them into his orbit where they cannot escape the gravitational pull of his cerulean eyes. Garfield likewise lets us forget about the petty rage that brews under Altman’s skin, understanding that behind every “No worries!” is a crash out waiting to happen. 

It is not just in Altman’s mannerisms where Guadagnino’s sensual tendencies as a creative shine. His filmmaking here is a deepening of his provocations around food, desire and power. Nary is there a scene where characters are not eating some form of roast meat (or in Altman’s case, obnoxiously slurping on a green smoothie), and Malik Hassan Sayeed’s cinematography delights in capturing not just its consumption, but also in the messy aftermath left behind that service workers have to clean up. It is a microcosm of these larger attitudes around innovation, that these men can feel free to pursue what they want and leave the collateral to the “lesser beings.”

Take another moment where we see Altman’s and Musk’s crew celebrating a technological breakthrough. As we see them rage, popping champagne near their crotches, teeth stained with half digested chips, the camera frames these crusty man children not unlike the way we might see apex predators in the wild or in a nature documentary. The presentation is damning and affecting: these are people ruled solely by appetite. In this way, Guadagnino never ceases to remind that for all of these people’s delusions of grandeur, they are still childish, not just in how they party, but in their unwillingness to consider any other’s well being but their own. 

Ironically, even as it trenchantly dissects our present moment, every creative decision radiates with that delightful unpredictability that only art created by humans can embody. The film’s quirks are evidence of humanity, from the desaturated framing a campfire sequence that makes all the OpenAI employees look like vampires starved of light, to the ways that Damon Albarn contributes not just several original songs to the film, but interlaces the score with analog sounds, to the aforementioned party sequence, where Guadagnino frames everyone except Altman and Sutskever in slow motion, showing how they are quite literally out of time. 

Truly, every creative decision points to the fact that there is a human behind the telling of this story. 

To reference any of the tech titans’ contemporary sins would risk only further dating this review (though if you will humor me, I find it quite humorous that Anthropic tried so hard to get faith leaders’ and theologians’ stamp of approval that their LLM, Claude, has a soul), so allow me to leaven the dough of fear with more ancient wisdom. In Pope Leo XIV’s “Encounter with the World of Cinema” address, he wrote in praise of human art: “Not everything has to be immediate or predictable. Defend slowness when it serves a purpose, silence when it speaks and difference when evocative. Beauty is not just a means of escape; it is above all an invocation. … It articulates the questions that dwell within us, and sometimes, even provokes tears that we did not know we needed to express.”

With “Artificial,” Guadagnino articulates with licentious flourish the ways in which we are already doomed, while also telling a story that offers hope that the human spirit, creativity and ingenuity are too diverse and rich to ever be pinned down to an algorithm.

The post ‘Artificial’ Review: Yura Borisov and Andrew Garfield Fight and Flirt Over the Fate of Our Technological Future appeared first on TheWrap.

The comedian brought back the controversial image of the famed theoretical astrophysicist during Monday’s monologue, where he unpacked artificial intelligence leaders’ promise of a better future.

“We’ve got a great show for you tonight. We’re doing something a little different tonight,” Stewart said at the top of the show. “We’re doing a theme show. Tonight’s program is all about AI.”

Audience members then erupted into a round of boos, prompting Stewart to respond with: “Suddenly, the audience takes a turn. My God, AI? We’re talking about it for the whole show, from A to I.”

“As you know, many of you here, there has been great concern lately over AI and what data centers will do to local communities,” he continued. “The threats posed by rogue AI agents. So President Trump called all of the biggest AI leaders to the White House to finally address the concerns of the American people. And you know that Trump is going to bring the heat because –”

Stewart’s crowd then interrupted his monologue with laughter. “Don’t be cynical,” he commented before continuing on. “He’s going to bring the heat. Trump has been very clear what he thinks about these Silicon Valley elites.”

“The Daily Show” then played all the times Trump insulted power players in the tech world, including Mark Zuckerberg – who he repeatedly called a “weirdo.”

“I got to say, I did not know Trump said true stuff at his rallies. I’ve been too hard on him,” Stewart quipped. “But no, no, this is going to be great.”

As Stewart pondered what Trump was set to announce, news footage played of the president declaring that AI leaders would “police themselves.”

“They’re tyrants. They’re tyrants. The enemies of the people will watch the dishonest,” Stewart responded. “The tyrants will watch the crooked. And everyone will keep an eye on the weirdo, right?”

“What happened? I thought you hated these guys. Now you got little inside jokes?” he continued. “What, did they give you millions of dollars or something? I’m being told they gave him millions of dollars.”

Stewart then questioned how the Trump administration could “justify letting the tech giants regulate themselves.”

Trump’s response? That these “seriously high IQ people” were “watching over each other.”

Here’s where Stewart drew attention to Hawking’s appearance in the Epstein files. “Wow. Well, yeah. I mean, seriously high IQ people would never have a problem watching over each other to make sure that moral and legal lines aren’t crossed,” Stewart quipped. “Like, in the 2008 financial crisis or this real Epstein files photo of Stephen Hawking.”

In response to the jab, the crowd at the “Daily Show” taping could be heard laughing, gasping and cheering for over 10-seconds as Stewart stared awkwardly into the camera.

“I thought it was a symposium,” Stewart then remarked while doing an impression of Hawking’s synthetic voice. This sparked another big reaction from the crowd, who loudly laughed as Stewart shrugged at the camera.

He added: “I was going to hell anyway.”

For Stewart’s full monologue, in which he debated Meta’s Muse mascot, watch the video above.

“The Daily Show” airs weeknights at 11 p.m. ET on Comedy Central.

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The controversy arose after Trump attempted to defend the ongoing military operation in Iran, telling rally attendees in Grand Island, Nebraska that it was a “small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe.”

“They can take out a city,” Trump said. “Let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay. And it’s going to be over with very soon. It’s … almost over with – and they might keep going a little long. You know, they always say they have a big threshold for pain. They need it. Let me tell you. They need it. But it’s going to end very soon. And it will end one way or the other.”

It didn’t take long for Trump’s remarks to circulate on X, prompting a big reaction from California Governor Gavin Newsom.

“After sending the National Guard and Marines to occupy California, Donald Trump is now saying our foreign enemies should ‘take out’ Los Angeles and San Diego,” Newsom wrote on X while sharing a clip of Trump’s comments. “He is deranged and dangerous.”

Veteran journalist Jim Acosta expressed a similar sentiment, writing on X, “The crowd starts to applaud as Trump fantasizes about LA and San Diego being wiped out by a nuclear attack. WTF. This is not normal.”

Additionally, Carrie Coon, the star of HBO’s “The Gilded Age,” pointedly wrote, “Can we take the keys away from Grandpa yet?”

While several of Trump’s supporters defended that the president was joking with the comment, several other X users made it clear they did not find the remark funny.

For a full round-up of reactions to Trump’s comment, keep reading. A representative for the White House did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.

The post Gavin Newsom, Jim Acosta and More Torch Trump After He Dares Iran to ‘Take Out’ Los Angeles or San Diego in Rally Speech appeared first on TheWrap.

According to insiders with knowledge, with Bloys’ contract with HBO slated to expire in 2027, the executive signed a multi-year extension ahead of joining the newly merged Paramount-Warner Bros., now called Skydance.

A representative for Warner Bros. did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.

Word of Bloys’ contract extension came hours after Skydance unveiled their new leadership team, which confirmed his position as co-chair and chief content officer for Skydance DTC. In regards to what Bloys will be overseeing for HBO Max and Paramount+, Skydance shared that he will be responsible for “original programming as well as strategy, operations, communications and performance across the company’s streaming platforms.”

In addition to Bloys, David Ellison and his co-CEO Ynon Kreiz confirmed Monday that JB Perrette, who previously served as Warner Bros. Discovery’s CEO and president of global streaming and games, would step into the position of co-chair and chief business officer of both Skydance TV and Skydance DTC, George Cheeks, who was the chair of TV media at Paramount Skydance, would become the co-chair and chief content officer at Skydance TV. They also confirmed that Mark Thompson and Bari Weiss will separately run CNN and CBS News, respectively.

“I’m incredibly proud to introduce the team that will lead Skydance forward, a group that reflects the ambition behind this historic combination,” Ellison shared in a statement. “Together, Paramount and Warner Bros. will form a creative-first home with the scale, imagination and technology to define entertainment for a generation.”

He added: “The leaders joining me have built some of the most beloved franchises and businesses in the industry, and they share a deep respect for the creative process and a belief that great stories have the power to entertain, unite and inspire audiences around the world. Their talent, experience and ambition are exactly what this moment demands, and together we will build a next-generation global media company that leads the industry in creative excellence and innovation, and delivers for audiences, creators, partners and shareholders alike.”

Kreiz expressed a similar sentiment, writing, ““Our goals as a team are to establish Skydance as the premier Hollywood content engine and home for the world’s leading storytellers, accelerate our integrated DTC platform with the best content, leading-edge technology and superior consumer experience, and optimize our highly profitable linear TV portfolio, reaching audiences globally across every entertainment vertical.”

He continued: “Together, we will: Win in storytelling by leveraging our creative capabilities, talent relationships, production prowess and expansive library of iconic IP; Build the most technologically capable media company through a modern tech platform to enhance the user experience, improve how we work and achieve operating efficiencies; and Lead in a crowded market by capitalizing on our scale, assets and global reach to compete in an evolving marketplace, drive synergies and grow our business.”

The post Casey Bloys Extends Deal to Oversee HBO Max and Paramount+ at Skydance appeared first on TheWrap.

In a post to Truth Social, the president said that, even though he believes the ads are “a rather standard thing to do,” he will pay for them through his super PAC, MAGA, Inc.

“The Radical Left is upset with the fact that I am taking Ads, which I consider to be a positive promotion for our Great U.S.A., and paying for them with U.S.A. money,” the president wrote.

He added: “This is a rather standard thing to do but, rather than doing that, although nothing will make them happy, I have decided to do the Patriotic Ads, among others, and pay for them myself, and with money I raised for MAGA, Inc.”

More than $10 million in taxpayer-funded ads have run since September, according to AdImpact, the ad-tracking service. Trump paid for the ads with funds from the Department of Homeland Security through a $20 million contract.

The ads first aired on Fox News last week and amid a number of NFL and college football games. There were four different ads and each featured a disclaimer, stating, “Paid for by the U.S. government.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Politicians on both sides of the aisle criticized the ads, citing them as a possible violation of federal laws for using taxpayer funds for “publicity or propaganda purposes.”

“That the Trump administration not only failed to acknowledge and investigate last week’s illegal ad, but instead doubled down and released a second piece of taxpayer-funded political propaganda during the mass-viewing moment of Sunday football is appalling and alarming,” Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, said in a statement. “These illegal ads should immediately be pulled from the air, and the White House’s many apparent violations of the law should be investigated.”

Federal Communications Commission chairman Brendan Carr defended the ad spend last week, saying there was no reason for concern about a crop of new taxpayer-funded ads supporting President Trump, calling them a “normal PSA.”

MAGA Inc. reportedly started September with about $415 million on hand. The organization and two super PACs affiliated with it have since set aside about $194 million for advertising ahead of November, according to AdImpact data.

The post Trump Says His Political Committee Will Pay for His TV Ads, Not Taxpayers appeared first on TheWrap.

“‘Artificial’ is a pitch-perfect dark comedy about the absence of responsibility in the face of apocalyptic certainty,” said @erickohn on X. “Andrew Garfield walks a fine line between movie monster, buffoonish mogul, and evil genius. A fun/scary ride that embodies the paradox at its center.”

The film, directed by Guadagnino and written by Simon Rich, follows Andrew Garfield as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman during the period when he was fired from and rehired by the company in 2023. “Anora’s” Yura Borisov co-stars as Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI’s co-founder and chief scientific officer.

“Guadagnino guts Silicon Valley with his obsessive pulse & a powerful farce in which Andrew Garfield completely shines,” said @jairojimenez_ on X. “A feverish, visceral corporate drama that proves what is truly artificial was never in the machines, but in the boardroom. An essential film.”

Amazon MGM initially lined up “Artificial” before controversially uncommitting to releasing the film on June 19, with speculation brewing that the company’s OpenAI ties contributed to the decision. This decision sparked conversation over the potential conflicting interests between tech firms and their entertainment development branches, with Amazon’s commitment to OpenAI coming at odds with the film’s content. Neon acquired the $40 million film roughly two weeks later after would-be suitors like Netflix and Focus Features dropped out of the race.

Now, it seems like Neon has another major awards contender on its hands.

“‘Artificial’ is tremendous, a blistering and furious reworking of ‘The Social Network’ for a world that’s well past the point of destruction, intimate in character but sweeping in scale, more acutely aware of our expiration date than any other film this year,” said @eventualforever on X. “A major achievement.”

You can view more reactions below.

“Artificial” releases in theaters on Dec. 25.

The post ‘Artificial’ First Reactions Praise Luca Guadagnino’s ‘Terrifying’ Sam Altman Biopic as an ‘Essential Film’ appeared first on TheWrap.

Songwriter Andrew Fox and book writer Joel Sinensky were reportedly inspired to write the show after a Twitter thread about Anne Frank’s “white privilege” went viral in 2022. As “Slam Frank” sees it, would the diary of Anne Frank have been published if written by a young girl of color, that is, someone named Anita Frank?

The satire begins even before that young heroine (Olivia Bernábe) appears. A show within a show, “Slam Frank” kicks off with an artistic director (John Anker Bow) welcoming us to the Orpheum Theatre with a “land acknowledgement” statement. The only problem is, he gets mixed up and can’t remember which indigenous tribes used to live there long before the neighborhood became the East Village.

This is the subversive world of “Slam Frank”! No minority group — or no strongly held belief, for that matter — escapes getting slapped down. But fear not: white cis males get the most punishment. As one character explains, “It’s men like you who voted for Hitler and got us in this damn mess in the first place!”

The show’s major change from its uncredited source material, “The Diary of Anne Frank,” is that Anne is now Anita, a Latina from a barrio in Frankfurt, Germany. When the family must immigrate to the Netherlands during World War II, not all of the Franks survive the trip. While old Abuela Frank (Amelia Louise Barr) drowns crossing some river, her spirit never leaves granddaughter Anita, who insists on writing her diary in Spanish.

Only briefly does she call herself Anne and write in English. That betrayal of her Latina roots comes when papa Otto Frank (Rocky Paterra) gently advises about the diary, “I know I told you to express yourself … but that was before I realized there could be a real market for this thing.”

Unlike “Oh, Mary!,” which is a complete fantasy, the nearly two-hour “Slam Frank” is a tad too faithful to its famous source material in the show’s first half hour. The Latina thing aside, Anne/Anita’s parents welcome the Van Daan family to their already-crowded Amsterdam hideout. The expected arguments about sharing food and space emerge, and as we know from “The Diary of Anne Frank,” older sister Margot (the double-cast Barr) quickly becomes the odd person out.

“Slam Frank” bills itself as the “Anne-Frank Afro-Latin Hip-Hop Musical,” and, indeed, Anne/Anita delivers a lively hip-hop number at the top of the show. In musical jargon, it is the ubiquitous “What I Want Song” that every musical needs to establish its heroine’s quest. Bernábe is just as spunky as the most insufferable Disney princess. Unfortunately, the lyrics of “An Immigrant Girl” are almost unintelligible thanks to Gage Baker’s brash sound design.

More problematic: Imagine if anyone wanted to turn “Oh, Mary!” into a musical. The music would slow down the play’s relentless rapid-fire pace. For the record, the most popular musicals are not musical comedies but rather musical romances with comic elements.

Sinensky’s book, fortunately, gathers momentum the further it strays from the real story. As wickedly retold here, the Franks and the Van Daans don’t miss a letter in what’s called LGBTQ. In fact, they add a few more to that overly long initialism: Anne/Anita’s love interest, the young Peter Van Daan (Alex Lewis), announces that he’s non-binary to absolutely no one’s surprise. Anne/Anita doesn’t stop loving him, leading her to believe she’s actually pansexual. This coming-out epidemic also leads Otto Frank to declare that he’s full-blown gay (also to no one’s surprise), which forces wife Edith (Austen Horne) to join the lavender bandwagon by saying she’s asexual. That she is also a Black militant feminist has already been well established by Horne’s strong impersonation of Angela Davis.

As a songwriter, Fox is at his best when he delivers spot-on parodies of Broadway’s ubiquitous anthems of empowerment.

The comic highpoint comes when Anne/Anita’s Latin heritage is explained with a show-stopping number that depicts the Frank family’s previous life in the Frankfurt barrio. It’s possible that this extended song, a reprise of “Rewrite My Diary,” might be more effective if placed in the show’s problematic first half-hour. In the show’s first few minutes, too many of the jokes regarding Anne really being Anita are more head-scratching than downright funny.

Anyone seeing “Slam Frank” must wonder how its makers will handle the Nazis’ brutal capture of the Franks and the Van Daans. The show doesn’t avoid that horror show so much as it supplants it with about a half dozen different endings, one more audacious and jaw dropping than the next. And yes, the word “Palestine” comes up.

Sam Lafrage’s direction can’t obscure some of the show’s early book problems. However, when the songs and story finally take off, Lafrage knows just how to create total comic chaos. Mayhem is the point.

The post ‘Slam Frank’ Off Broadway Review: How Do You Parody the Holocaust’s Most Beloved Young Heroine? appeared first on TheWrap.

The drama started on Fox News’ “The Big Weekend Show,” when contributor Tomi Lahren weighed in on Ms. Rachel (also known as Rachel Anne Accurso)’s past collaborations with left-wing figures, including New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

“I’d also say this person here on your screen is Hasan Piker in overalls and a stupid headband,” Lahren noted during the conversation. “So, if that’s what you want your kids to be watching, if that’s what you want to be forming their ideas and their world view on, by all means.”

As Lahren went on, she took aim at Ms. Rachel’s appearance, adding, “There she looks age appropriate in that one photo.”

“Listen, you can be a leftie and you can be like, a kids’ educator, right? And you can be like, ‘I’m a Democrat,’ whatever,” she continued. “But when you go so far as to advocate for things like Hamas, Palestine and you cloud people’s judgement on what exactly a genocide is and who’s to blame and you talk about Israel then you are not a children’s educator anymore. You’re a political activist. Like I said, Hasan Piker in a headband and overalls. So, parents, if that’s what you want, I guess keep watching Ms. Rachel.”

It didn’t take long for the clip to circulate widely on X, with the Fox News snippet garnering over 1.7 million views. Piker also caught wind of the clip, writing in response on X Sunday evening, “Two people who don’t want children to be slaughtered. Ofc that’s unacceptable for Fox News.”

As for Ms. Rachel, who has repeatedly spoken out and advocated for children in war-torn Gaza, as well as defended her advocacy as humanitarian in nature rather than political, she did not directly address the footage. However, she did post a clip from her appearance on “It’s Open with Ilana Glazer,” where she called on celebrities to use their platforms to speak out about the situation in Gaza.

“If you are so famous and you’re un-cancellable, and you’re so famous and you won’t even say like, ‘Kids in Gaza should have schools, people in Gaza should have hospitals,’” she said in the footage, commenting on the Ed Sheeran-Macklemore debacle. “Why can’t you risk something to help save lives?”

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As we reported last month, Ms. Rachel spoke out against Sheeran for letting Macklemore be booted from his Loop tour over his “Free Palestine” remarks.

“Ed Sheeran had an opportunity [to] show that we won’t be bullied into punishing people for supporting Palestine,” she wrote at the time. “Instead he caved to people who refuse to accept what the world knows. A genocide is happening in Gaza. We all need to speak out against it.”

She added: “If more than 20,000 white children were killed in another part of the world, everyone would be shouting about it at their concerts. Treating some children’s lives as less worthy of outrage is racist. Silence during a genocide is not neutral.”

Ms. Rachel later matched Macklemore’s $1 million donation to support Palestine, writing, “I invite every wealthy white celebrity to match it and speak out against the genocide in Gaza … We have a moral obligation to use our privilege and platforms to protect children and human rights.”

The post Hasan Piker Defends Ms. Rachel After Fox News Warns Parents Against Watching Her Content appeared first on TheWrap.