Departing Georgia lawmaker knocked for his racist antics on Sacha Baron Cohen's 'Who Is America?'
Everybody, I'd like to you meet Jason Spencer.
Jason is a soon-to-be-former state representative in Georgia -- he lost the election primary in May to a newcomer, too bad so sad -- who's enjoying some last-minute infamy in office as the butt of a Sacha Baron Cohen joke. You see, it's still poor form in the USA (for now) to publicly perpetuate racist stereotypes and scream the N-word repeatedly.
That's exactly what Jason did when he was duped into appearing on camera with a heavily disguised Cohen, as part of an anti-terrorism training video. I'm not going to repeat the litany of ever-escalating gaffes he commits; you can see it for yourself.
Try not to wonder how anyone could possibly be this stupid as shit keeps getting weirder and weirder. That way lies madness.
Lovely fellow, right?
Jason's behavior earned him sharp rebukes from his soon-to-be-former colleagues in the George House of Representatives.
"Representative Spencer has disgraced himself and should resign immediately," the House speaker (and a Republican), David Ralston, said in a statement. "Georgia is better than this."
Governor Nathan Deal, also a Republican, had a similarly sharp response to the Who Is America? clip in a tweet of his own.
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For his part, Jason blamed the whole thing on threatening calls he and his wife had received in the past. Those calls, he said, came in 2017 after he introduced an anti-masking bill that would have effectively banned Muslim women from concealing their faces.
Public outrage eventually resulted in Jason abandoning the bill in late 2016, but he described how threatening calls the following year left him in a precarious state of mind in a series of text messages sent to The Washington Post's Steven Zeitchik.
"Sacha Baron Cohen and his associates took advantage of my paralyzing fear that my family would be attacked."
You can read the whole thread of texts starting here:
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Despite the calls for his immediate resignation, Jason apparently intends to stick out his remaining five months in office. Bold strategy, Jason. Let's see if it pays off for you.
Topics Politics
Adam Rosenberg is a Senior Games Reporter for Mashable, where he plays all the games. Every single one. From AAA blockbusters to indie darlings to mobile favorites and browser-based oddities, he consumes as much as he can, whenever he can.Adam brings more than a decade of experience working in the space to the Mashable Games team. He previously headed up all games coverage at Digital Trends, and prior to that was a long-time, full-time freelancer, writing for a diverse lineup of outlets that includes Rolling Stone, MTV, G4, Joystiq, IGN, Official Xbox Magazine, EGM, 1UP, UGO and others.Born and raised in the beautiful suburbs of New York, Adam has spent his life in and around the city. He's a New York University graduate with a double major in Journalism and Cinema Studios. He's also a certified audio engineer. Currently, Adam resides in Crown Heights with his dog and his partner's two cats. He's a lover of fine food, adorable animals, video games, all things geeky and shiny gadgets.
