Comedian Bill Burr became frustrated with reporters after they questioned him about billionaire Elon Musk and attempted to make him weigh in on politics in an exchange last month.
Pressed by journalist Nicholas Ballasy about the comic’s recent attacks on Musk, Burr got irritated as he arrived at a March 23 Kennedy Center event honoring Conan O’Brien, the longtime late-night host who often had Burr as a guest.
Regarding the remarks, originally made on “The View,” Burr said, “I don’t watch the news.” He added, “I have no idea what’s going on. I watch Instagram. I watch people wipe out on motorcycles. I watch lions and hyenas fight each other…. I don’t think you should be asking a comedian. You’re a journalist.”
Ballasy continued to press Burr about his political opinions.
“But comedians are on top of current events,” he said.
“No. That’s weak,” Burr shot back. “That’s you guys passing the buck. You guys need to have balls again, which you don’t. You guys always go, ‘Should we be thinking this?’ … You guys present stuff like that. You guys used to have balls. You need to get your balls back and it’s not my job. I’m a dancing clown.”
On March 20, he appeared on “The View” and attacked Musk, saying, “I think Elon has got the rockets going because they realize there’s other Earths out there, and they’re going to trash this one. Because they don’t have any concern for it. And they’re going to move onto the next Earth and, you know, everybody’s going to be standing down here in their blue and red ties going, ‘Wait a minute, I was on your side.’ And they’re just going to leave.”
Burr also shot down questions about Luigi Mangione, who is accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in one of the most highly publicized murder cases in the country.
BILL BURR TELLS ‘THE VIEW’ ELON MUSK GOING TO ‘TRASH’ THE PLANET
“Tell us about your reaction to Luigi Mangione,” another reporter asked Burr. “I was reading up, you know, that perhaps you’ve been supportive of what he did. What is your take on that?”
“If you were reading up, I don’t think you read up on it, ‘cause I said what I felt about it and I said what a lot of people said,” Burr responded.
“Some people took it that way,” the reporter said. “So could you clarify what you think about it?”
“No. No, I’m not going to just have some controversial moment so you can get clicks,” Burr said. “I’m not doing that. I mean, I’m here for Conan. I’m not doing all of this. What are you going to bring up next, the Middle East? I went to summer school three out of four years in high school. I’m not qualified to talk about this.”
Regarding Mangione, Burr spoke to Variety magazine in January and expressed some amusement at the suspected murderer putting pressure on healthcare CEOs.
“The funny thing when that CEO got whacked was watching CEOs have to be uncomfortable,” Burr said. “I’m sure they didn’t learn anything, but it’s like: This is how you make everybody feel day to day as you apply pressure because ‘that’s how business is done.’ How you leave this burning wreckage of destroyed lives as you ‘restructure’ and ‘consolidate.’ It was fun to see them worry.”
Fox News’ Sarah Rumpf-Whitten contributed to this report.
