Academy Award-winner and longtime critic of Donald Trump, Robert De Niro, took aim at the president’s latest tacky spectacle during a speech at a protest event on Sunday.
Speaking at the Rise Up, Sing Out concert hosted by the Committee for the First Amendment in New York City on Sunday night, De Niro made fun of Trump’s 80th birthday UFC extravaganza.
Hosted in a specially constructed arena on the White House South Lawn, the event, which featured musical guests, aerial displays, and a seven-fight card, was officially planned to celebrate America’s 250th anniversary; unofficially, it was held on the president’s 80th birthday, and he made sure that he was the star of the show.
Poking fun at the pomp and circumstance while welcoming attendees to the protest event held at New York’s Town Hall, the Raging Bull star said, “Good evening, everyone, and welcome to all of you who couldn’t get tickets to the White House cage fights.”
The event, hosted by the Committee for the First Amendment, an organization formed in 1947 in response to the HUAC hearings and revived in 2025 by Jane Fonda, boasted a star-studded line-up, including Fonda, Bette Midler, Julia Roberts, and De Niro’s Killers of the Flower Moon co-star Lily Gladstone.
In his speech, De Niro described conflicting feelings about his country ahead of its 250th anniversary because of the Trump presidency, telling the audience that “our country isn’t so lovable right now.”
“I hate to say it, but loving our country is starting to sound like an abused spouse saying they love their abuser,” the 82-year-old actor said.
“I can’t love a country that starts stupid and inhumane wars, killing thousands of innocents and indirectly causing the deaths and suffering of millions more,” he continued. “I can’t love a country that takes healthcare away from millions of people and uses that money to enrich their pals in the Trump-Epstein class. I can’t love a country that sends out masked militias to shoot citizens in the streets, torture our neighbors, and separate families.”
Singling out Trump, he added to loud cheers and applause, “I can’t love a country that’s led by a racist, misogynist, xenophobic tyrant. And let me just say it: I can’t love a country that’s led by Donald Trump and his sycophant Congress.”
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
The Academy Award winner is an incredibly vocal critic of the Trump administration, attending a No Kings Day event in New York in March and throwing his support behind the movement “150 percent.”
“There have been other presidents who have tested the constitutional limits of their power, but none have been such an existential threat to our freedoms and security, except Trump,” he said, adding, “He must be stopped, and he must be stopped now.”
The star even used his acceptance speech for the Honorary Palme d’Or to rail against the president, slamming his hostile takeover of the Kennedy Center and dubbing Trump “America’s philistine president.”
Trump, for his part, has responded to De Niro’s continued attacks by dubbing him “Trump Deranged” and accusing him of “criminal“ speech.
“They should actually get on a boat with Trump Deranged Robert De Niro, another sick and demented person with, I believe, an extremely Low IQ, who has absolutely no idea what he is doing or saying – some of which is seriously CRIMINAL!” the 80-year-old wrote on Truth Social in February.
De Niro has dismissed the “Trump Derangement Syndrome” accusations hurled at him by the president’s supporters as “nonsense,” and has refused to back down from his highly public criticisms of the president, including in his speech on Sunday.
“For most of my life, I did love this country. The United States of America welcomed my immigrant ancestors, it gave me and my family and my fellow citizens such rich opportunities and extraordinary freedoms,” the actor told the crowd in New York on Sunday.
“I want to love my country again. I want my country back.”
