Andrew Yang responded to racist comments made by “Saturday Night Live” member Shane Gillis, saying “our country has become excessively punitive and vindictive about remarks that people find offensive or racist.”
Yang, who is a Taiwanese American, told CNN that racist comments hurt and should be considered seriously when they happen.
However, Gillis’ comments “should be taken differently” because of his comedy background.
“I’ve experienced a lot of anti-Asian racism throughout my upbringing. And it hurts. It is something that is very real,” he said. “And I do think anti-Asian racial epithets are not taken as seriously as slurs against other groups. But at the same time, bigger picture, I believe that our country has become excessively punitive and vindictive about remarks that people find offensive or racist and that we need to try and move beyond that if we can, particularly in a case where the person is, in this case to me, like a comedian whose words should be taken in a slightly different light.”
Yang previously responded to Gillis’ comments on Twitter Saturday, writing that he prefer comedy that “makes people think and doesn’t take cheap shots.”
Yang said he doesn’t think Gillis should lose his job, either. Gillis was cut from the show Monday afternoon.
“We would benefit from being more forgiving rather than punitive,” Yang tweeted. “But if I can forgive Shane, as the guy he called a slur, I hope others can as well,” he wrote. “I also hope Shane is open to learning. We are all human, we’re all fallible.”
Conservative radio host Jesse Lee Peterson criticized Yang on his radio show two weeks ago, labeling him as a “communist.”
“There is this little Asian guy or Chinese guy or whatever he is, he should go back to China or wherever he came from,” Peterson said, according to Newsweek.
“You allow these people to come into our country and they come in with their socialist, communist ideas,” he continued.
”Can we send this guy back to wherever he came from? Let him go over there and give away free stuff. Why is he coming here to turn America into the place that he left?”
”What a sick person,” he added. “Beta male. They need to send him back to Taiwan or wherever he came from.”
But Yang was born in Schenectady, New York, and is the son of Taiwanese immigrants, according to Newsweek.