The Babylon Bee received backlash after it published a parody article about Vivek Ramaswamy being offered "a cabinet position running the White House 7-Eleven."
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Babylon Bee Receives Backlash After ‘Racist’ Joke About Vivek Ramaswamy Running ‘White House 7-Eleven’
Charlie NashJan 16th, 2024, 7:51 pm
X/@TheBabylonBee
Conservative comedy website “The Babylon Bee” received backlash on Tuesday after it published a parody news article about
Vivek Ramaswamy being offered “a cabinet position running the White House 7-Eleven convenience store.”
After Ramaswamy
dropped out of the Republican presidential race and endorsed former President
Donald Trump, the Babylon Bee published an
article titled, “Trump Promises Vivek An Administration Position Running The White House 7-Eleven,” which joked that Ramaswamy had accepted the “olive branch” position from Trump.
The parody article included a fake quote of “Trump” saying, “I’ve always said Vimbik Rumpsalami was a great man, one of the greatest men, to be honest… That’s why I’ve asked Rikki-Tikki-Tavi if he would accept the honor of running the White House 7-Eleven in the West Wing.”
While many social media users were amused by the post, which received more than 10,000 likes, others accused the Babylon Bee of racism and said it had gone too far.
“Never quite sure what’s worse about this right wing wannabe Onion site – that it’s just unfunny or that it’s openly bigoted,”
reacted former MSNBC host
Mehdi Hasan, while Bloomberg columnist
Matthew Yglesias tweeted, “Racist yes but also I think outdated … isn’t a more contemporary stereotype of an Indian guy that he’d be a tech executive?”
The Blaze host
Steve Deace called the joke “one of the most brutal headlines these guys have ever done,” while conservative cartoonist
George Alexopoulos reacted simply, “Yikes.”
In response to the criticism, Babylon Bee editor-in-chief
Kyle Mann doubled down on the joke,
tweeting, “Too far, guys thank you come again” – a reference to the Indian Kwik-E-Mart owner Apu Nahasapeemapetilon from
The Simpsons.
The Babylon Bee is no stranger to controversy, and in March 2023, the website even came under fire from former President Trump himself.
After records showed that Trump’s rival
Ron DeSantis had paid the Babylon Bee $21,500, Trump
called the website “a non-entity” and argued, “You don’t spend that much money on The Babylon Bee if you’re running for Governor, in fact, you don’t spend money on The Babylon Bee if you’re running for anything.”