Karamo Brown opened up about a frightening incident that occurred after he called his “Dancing with the Stars” co-star Sean Spicer a “really sweet guy.”
Brown said that his son was walking down the street in Philadelphia when people started yelling threatening messages at him.
“He was running home because somebody was in a car chasing after him in the car screaming at him, ‘F you and your dad! You’re going to die!’” the “Queer Eye” star, 28, said on Catt Sadler’s “Naked Podcast.” “That’s what I don’t like. That’s the part that really makes me emotional and gets me upset. When I have to squeeze my hands — the daddy protective in me is just like, don’t do that.”
Brown was flooded with negative comments on social media after speaking positively of President Trump’s former press secretary who resigned in 2017, so much so that he temporarily deleted his Twitter and deactivated the comments feature on his Instagram.
“The hate started coming at me. And normally I can handle the hate, because I’m okay with having constructive conversations, but what I realized is that places like Twitter, you can’t have constructive conversations,” he said. “It’s the mob mentality. And so once the mob feels like they have their target, they’re going to get you…And then it was really the first tweet I saw where they ‘at’ my child as well — I was like, done! And I got off of it.”
While Brown disapproves of the trolling and threats he encountered, he does understand why his comments on Spicer were controversial.
“To be honest with you, I understood why people got upset,” he said. “I am not delusional. I’m with them. You know seeing someone lie to the American public and be a part of an administration that is hurting us, it was bad.”
The “DWTS” participant said he simply based his opinion on his three-minute interaction with Spicer and that his “natural instinct is to be kind to every human being.”
“I literally said, ‘I don’t want to talk to you about politics right now because I would like to get to know you really quickly so that we can then grow to have a respectful conversation where we can talk about this.’”
Brown says the whole ordeal was a learning experience and he would not take back his words.
“Because in our interaction, he was [nice,] and I know that sounds crazy because again, I understand,” he said. “I’m not trying to be delusional — you know I’m somebody who has worked with many politicians to try to fight against things that this administration has done and is doing. But again, he was a human being that was nice in that moment.”
He added, “The thing is, I don’t regret saying what I said … every lesson teaches me something more.”
When news dropped that Spicey would be joining “DWTS,” Brown told “Access” at the time, “He’s a really good guy, really sweet guy.”
He added, “People would look at us and think that we’re polar opposites, but I’m a big believer that if you can talk to someone and meet in the middle, you can learn about each other and help each other both grow.”