Former NBA player Dennis Rodman didn’t take too kindly to being questioned about his trip to North Korea, losing it on CNN anchor Chris Cuomo during an interview aired Tuesday.
During the prerecorded exclusive, Cuomo pressed Rodman and the rest of the former NBA players participating in the trip — which was organized as a birthday present for North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un — about the politics behind their visit.
Charles Smith, a former NBA player who served as the informal spokesman during the video interview from North Korea, explained that the basketball game for Jong-Un’s birthday was merely a way to put smiles on people’s faces and show people what Americans can be like.
“Please don’t continue to put politics into this,” Smith said. “That’s not what we’re here for.”
But Cuomo called the visit “more complicated than basketball” and pointed out that North Korea hasn’t been on good terms with the United States, especially in regard to the imprisonment of American Kenneth Bae.
And after continued back-and-forth between Smith and Cuomo, Rodman couldn’t stay silent any longer, exploding on the CNN anchor when asked about whether or not he would speak to Jong-Un on behalf of Bae’s family.
“The one thing about politics — Kenneth Bae did one thing,” Rodman mumbled angrily, waving away Smith’s attempted intervention. “If you understand — if you understand what Kenneth Bae did. Do you understand what he did in this country?”
“What did he do?” Cuomo asked. “You tell me.”
“No, you tell me!” Rodman yelled. “You tell me! Why is he held captive?”
Rodman then began explaining how the ten former players had left their families to come to play this game, screaming and swearing at Cuomo as Smith tried to calm him down.
“They came here!” Rodman shouted. “They came here!”
Cuomo told Rodman to stop using his fellow NBA greats as a shield, which caused the former player to erupt again. Smith then accused Cuomo of “baiting” them by talking about politics.
After the interview aired, Cuomo told fellow anchor Kate Bolduan that it was a shame the other players had been caught up in Rodman’s “circus.”
“It looked like some of them didn’t want to be there,” Bolduan noted.
Cuomo then praised the men for attempting the cultural exchange, but said Rodman was “speaking out of school” by implying anything about Bae’s guilt.
In early 2013, the North Korean government sentenced Bae to 15 years in prison, believing him to be part of a plot to overthrow the country’s political system. Bae is just one piece in the puzzle of strained U.S.-North Korea relations in recent years. In March of last year, North Korea declared itself to be in a “state of war” with South Korea. And in May, the country tested short-range missiles off its coast, further alarming the international community after threatening both South Korea and the U.S.
After Rodman’s last visit to North Korea in September, he said that talking to Jong-Un about Bae was ‘not his job.’
(h/t Mediaite)
