Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling was called for traveling — to an 18th-century plantation — after his racist rant against blacks was caught on tape.
Despite several NBA stars calling for Sterling’s ouster, league commissioner Adam Silver announced Saturday night no action would be taken pending the results of an investigation.
The comments even drew a response from President Barack Obama who at a town hall meeting in Malaysia Sunday described the statements as “incredibly offensive racist statements.”
The president said they are part of a continuing legacy of slavery and segregation that Americans must vigilantly fight.
“When ignorant folks want to advertise their ignorance, you don’t really have to do anything, you just let them talk,” Obama said.
Silver said the probe would focus on whether it was in fact Sterling who was recorded telling his mixed-race gal pal not to bring blacks to Clippers games.
“All members of the NBA family should be afforded due process and a fair opportunity to represent their side of any controversy, which is why I’m not yet prepared to discuss any potential sanctions against Donald Sterling,” Silver said, calling the comments on the tape “offensive and disgusting.”
“We will, however, move extraordinarily quickly in our investigation.”
Silver added that Sterling has agreed not to attend the Clippers’ Sunday playoff game.
The eccentric Sterling apparently specifically slam-dunked Hall of Famer Magic Johnson during the shocking nine-minute recorded conversation.
“How about your whole life, every day, you could do what you want?” a man identified as Sterling said at one point in the conversation recorded on April 9. “You can sleep with (blacks), you can bring them in, you can do whatever you want.”
He was apparently incensed that 20-something gal pal V. Stiviano posted a photo of herself with Johnson on Instagram.
“The little I ask you is not to promote it and not to bring them to my games,” Sterling railed.
Speaking of Johnson, the 80-year-old billionaire bluntly told his girlfriend: “Don’t put him on an Instagram for the world to have to see so they have to call me. And don’t bring him to my games, OK?”
Sterling and the Clippers organization cast doubt on the recording, saying they didn’t know if the voices had been altered. “We do know that the woman on the tape — who we believe released it to TMZ — is the defendant in a lawsuit brought by the Sterling family, alleging that she embezzled more than $1.8 million, who told Mr. Sterling that she would get even,” a team statement read.
In the suit filed in March, Sterling’s wife of more than 50 years rips Stiviano as a manipulative gold digger. Rochelle Sterling claims that her husband bought Stiviano a 2012 Ferrari, two Bentleys and a 2013 Range Rover, with a total value exceeding $500,0000, according to the Los Angeles Times.
The team owner apologized to anyone who may have been hurt by the tirade “being attributed to him.”
Still, the outrage against Sterling was instantaneous, with ex-Lakers star Johnson leading the attack after TMZ.com posted the audio clip on the Web.
Calls came for the Clippers to boycott their Sunday playoff game unless Sterling was immediately and severely disciplined by the league.
“You can’t have this guy making statements like that,” said ex-NBA star Charles Barkley while broadcasting on TNT’s NBA coverage. “You have to suspend him and fine him immediately.”
“LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling’s comments about African Americans are a black eye for the NBA,” an angry Johnson said via Twitter. “(My wife) and I will never go to a Clippers game again as long as Donald Sterling is the owner.”
Added Miami Heat star LeBron James: “There is no room for Donald Sterling in our league.”
Voices as disparate as San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich and rapper Snoop Dogg were united in condemning the vile comments.
Snoop Dogg posted a video denouncing Sterling as a “redneck, white bread … racist piece of s—.”
Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network promised to bring protesters to the Staples Center when the Clippers return home Tuesday night.
Sterling, in the lengthy conversation, repeatedly makes it clear to Stiviano, who is black and Mexican, that he doesn’t want her associating with African-Americans. “I love the black people,” he continues. “I’m just saying in your lousy f—ing Instagrams, you don’t have to have yourself walking with black people.”
In a bizarre twist, Sterling was given a Lifetime Achievement award from the NAACP in 2009 and was scheduled to receive another one next month.
