Joe Rogan has tried to explain away the vile slur that was hurled at former first lady Michelle Obama during Donald Trump’s birthday fight night at the White House.
Rogan was confronted by Ali Siddiq about UFC fighter Josh Hokit’s disgusting remark during his podcast on Tuesday.
Rogan, who was the event’s master of ceremonies, held the microphone to Hokit when he yelled, “Michelle Obama is a man! Am I right, America?”
CNN reported that Trump “appeared to show a half-smile” when the comment was made. Rogan did not address the comment in the ring and has never directly condemned it, but was forced to address it by Siddiq.
Rogan was making his case for how to “make America great” during his discussion with Siddiq, after which the comedian turned the tables on him, asking how Hokit’s vile slur fits in.
“How did that help?” Siddiq asked.
“It’s really divisive because you know that a large portion of the country is going to take this, is going to have a problem with this,” he added. “You know, clearly she’s not a man.”
Rogan did not answer right away, but Siddiq pressed on.
“It makes no sense to me... I’ve never seen this many people say so many damaging things about a past president,” he said. “It’s like he’s still on the forefront. And it’s not like we have a president that’s doing the greatest job for this country, you know, which is a weird thing to me.”
Siddiq then asked the still-silent Rogan, “Is that the real belief of people?”
Rogan finally answered.
“Well, listen,” he said. “There’s some crazy people that believe the world is flat. There’s a lot of dumb beliefs. There’s probably people that do believe Michelle Obama is a man.”
Rogan then launched into an explainer on the UFC fighter’s “character” instead—a deflective maneuver he also used when he discussed the outburst with Tim Dillon last month.
“What that guy does, he’s like a pro wrestler. Like, he’s got a character called The Incredible Hoke,” Rogan explained.
“It’s very corny in a lot of ways. Sometimes it’s, you know, cringy. But the point is, he gets a lot of attention because of all this. That’s what he’s doing. So what he’s trying to do is maximize the amount of attention that he can get for a very short window of career. This is not how he really feels, how he really thinks.”
Rogan admitted that the remark was, at the least, “divisive.”
“It is very divisive, don’t get me wrong, but that’s by design,” he said. “I don’t agree with it. I don’t—I wouldn’t do it. It’s not my thing. I don’t like it. But I get it, and it’s smart.”
Last month, Rogan said that having Hokit fight at the White House was likely not a good idea, given that part of his “shtick” is saying the most attention-grabbing things.
“They probably, in retrospect, if they wanted to avoid this, probably shouldn’t have had him fight on the White House lawn,” he said, “because if he said that at the T-Mobile Arena or in Madison Square Garden—outrageous—but not that big a deal.”
