Charlamagne Tha God says that his controversial meeting with Tomi Lahren was orchestrated by Viacom executives, and regrets his 'dumb-ass' tweet about the incident
- Insider recently published an in-depth profile of "The Breakfast Club" host Charlamagne Tha God.
- He revealed that his infamous 2016 meeting with Tomi Lahren was orchestrated by Viacom executives.
- Read the entire profile here.
In a series of interviews with Insider, "The Breakfast Club" host Charlamagne Tha God revealed that his controversial 2016 meeting with conservative pundit Tomi Lahren - an incident he once described as "The Tomi Tsunami" - was orchestrated by Viacom executives.
According to Charlamagne, the executives thought the two could do well together on a talk show. But he wasn't interested.
"My mind was like no, 'absolutely not,'" he said about the potential show. "We had a conversation and it didn't take me long to realize that it's a lot of performative aspects to what she's doing." (Viacom nor Lahren responded to a request for comment.)
Lahren, who had in late 2016 taped a highly criticized episode of "The Daily Show," met with Charlamagne shortly after. Footage of the two outside Viacom's offices in Times Square was widely shared.
Soon after, Charlamagne tweeted that perhaps a left-leaning woman of color should launch an online platform like Lahren's. His tweet was slammed by prominent Black women like comedian Franchesca Ramsey and writer Jamilah Lemieux.
"It was just stupid. It was just a dumb-ass tweet," he told Insider. "The reason it was stupid was for one reason: All those sisters were there. All those sisters were already out there doing the work ... We weren't doing our part to uplift them."