If most of us got away with staging a hate crime hoax because Michelle Obama’s former chief of staff bailed us out, we’d probably attempt to fade into relative obscurity as quickly as possible. Not Jussie Smollett. He seems keen to rub as much salt in the wound as possible, with his attorney making the rounds on morning news proposing a new defense: Yes, two white men did attack Smollett — the Nigerian brothers, but wearing whiteface.
To recap, Smollett allegedly enlisted the Osundairo brothers to participate in his hate-crime hoax. The brothers had appeared as extras on “Empire,” the show on which Smollett starred (or stars?). The Nigerian brothers moonlight as trainers, and Smollett tried to use this fact to explain the $3,500 check he wrote them, allegedly to help him stage the attack on himself. (The brothers charge around $50 per hour of training.)
There are more than a few problems with Smollett’s new spin. While it’s theoretically possible that two black men could put on enough makeup to appear white at 2 a.m. in the middle of one of the worst polar vortexes in Chicago’s recent history, it’s highly unlikely that people who weren’t strangers to Smollett could get away with it. The recently released Chicago police department filing obtained by CWBChicago via a Freedom of Information Act request revealed that law enforcement has two photos of Smollett in a car with the Nigerian brothers. Presumably they were already familiar with each other since the brothers had appeared on Smollett’s show, they had made phone calls to each other, and Smollett had given them a check for, ahem, “training.”
I, for one, can easily see how you could confuse two Nigerian fitness trainers that you know personally for white MAGA racists. Sure.
For what it’s worth, the police department and Mayor Rahm Emanuel aren’t taking the corruption of Kimberly Foxx and her cronies in the State’s Attorney’s office lying down. According to CBS Chicago, Emanuel’s having the police tally the bill of the Smollett investigation and sending it to the actor with the memo line to read “For Hoax, I’m sorry.” Smollett seems sociopathic enough that he may pay the bill and maintain his lie of innocence. Surely enough, lying liars have already granted him cover, slowly but surely attempting to paint the police as corrupt.
Oh my god, they’re actually going to take his side on this pic.twitter.com/oaAfHsHhF6
— Alex Griswold (@HashtagGriswold) March 28, 2019
If President Trump’s earlier tweets are indeed true, the feds are taking over the investigation. Yet Smollett may get away with his 16 felonies anyway, as Foxx has already run interference in sealing and expunging his record. The timeline alone of her activity in the investigation is damning enough, with her beginning talks with the Smollett camp on Feb. 1, “recusing herself” some two weeks later, waiting almost another week to announce it publicly, and now defending herself by claiming she didn’t actually recuse herself, just “colloquially.” Foxx is probably going down, finally, and righfully so.
Yet even amid reports that the “Empire” crew has devolved into civil war over the matter, Smollett may just have gotten away with it all scot-free. He says he just wants to return to work and his old life.
Well, I can actually think of one last set of brothers who may throw a wrench in Smollett’s entire scheme. The Hollywood kingmaker and CEO of the largest talent agency in town, William Morris Endeavor: Ari Emanuel, brother to one very, very, vengeful mayor.
