Marc Anthony Fires Back After Racist Tweets About 'God Bless America' Performance at MLB All-Star Game
Tuesday night's MLB All-Star Game brought with it plenty of exciting baseball from some of the most talented players in the world. Unfortunately, it also brought with a fair amount of unwarranted racism. Now, the victim of that racism, singer Marc Anthony, is firing back.
Shortly after Anthony arrived at Citi Field in Flushing, N.Y. to sing "God Bless America," a number of people took to Twitter to voice their displeasure over Major League Baseball's selection of him. Their main point of contention had nothing to do with his ability, and everything to do with his race.
"Why is Marc Anthony singing "God Bless America?" He's not even American. Shoulda got someone sweet like Kesha," tweeted Spencer Babcock (@jakebabcock).
"Another disgrace Marc Anthony singing god bless America.Is he even an American citizen?" tweeted another Twitter user, Brian Edwards (@Dusboy7).
The problem with these tweets, of course, is that Anthony is an American. He was born in New York to Puerto Rican parents and grew up in Spanish Harlem. Apparently for some people, being Hispanic precludes one from being American.
Anthony was on LIVE! With Kelly and Michael on Thursday, and he did not back down from talk over the racist tweets. He was on the show to talk about his upcoming world tour "Vivir Mi Vida," but the conversation quickly turned to his experience singing at the All-Star Game, as well as the fallacious remarks made about him afterwards.
"You know, something happened that I really wanted to mention, and I wanted to clarify ... you know, me singing the national anthem, there were some statements made that people were upset that they would have somebody from another country sing the national anthem. But to set the record straight, I was born and raised in New York, you can't get more New York than me," noted Anthony on the subject.
Both Kelly Ripa and Michael Strahan seemed shocked at the news of what had happened, but Anthony dealt with it all in stride. He did not mince his words when describing where his loyalties lie.
"I just want to set the record straight. And I'm more Puerto Rican than ever and more New York than ever," Anthony observed, quickly drawing cheers and applause from the audience.
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