Actor Jack Black’s rock band Tenacious D sparked outrage and postponed an Australian show after band member Kyle Gass apparently joked about trying to assassinate former US President Donald Trump on Saturday.
Footage posted on social media from the band’s Sydney show on Black Sunday showed Gass presenting Gass with a birthday cake on stage and telling him to “make a wish”.
Gass replied: “Don’t get Trump wrong next time.”
An Australian parliamentarian called for their expulsion after a video of the moment emerged.
Tenacious D was supposed to play in the city of Newcastle, in the Australian state of New South Wales, this Tuesday (16), but producer Frontier Touring announced that the show had been “postponed”.
Although some users interpreted the conversation as a joke, Australian Senator Ralph Babet said the pair should be “immediately removed from the country” in a statement published on X (formerly Twitter).
“It is horrible, shameful, dirty, evil and unacceptable in any way, shape or form to advocate and/or call for the assassination of a president,” Babet said. “That was not a joke, he was very serious when he wanted the president dead.”
“I urge Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to join me in denouncing Tenacious D, Jack Black and band member Kyle Gass, and I urge Immigration Minister Andrew Giles to revoke their visas and deport them immediately,” Babet said Tuesday.
“Support for the shooting and attempted assassination of Donald J. Trump is nothing without deportation,” he said.
According to Tenacious D’s website, the band is scheduled to play in Brisbane on Thursday, before heading to Melbourne and Adelaide, and then on to New Zealand and the US.
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