Legendary actor Richard Gere said from Germany that he feels “deeply ashamed” of the U.S. government’s words about immigrants.
Gere was the guest of honor at a special event in Berlin, Germany, organized by the Hertie School Centre for Fundamental Rights and The Gere Foundation.
He gave a speech at the event’s start.
He said, “Have you ever thought that America could go down to this kind of level?
Did you ever imagine that someone so crazy could become President of the United States and try to destroy it?” He was talking about President Donald Trump.
He continued:
Human history is, in many ways, the history of migration, of movement. It’s a story of people adapting, building, contributing, and dreaming. And yet, somehow, in today’s debates, we often speak about migrants, about refugees as if they were different from us. I think the term I was actually given today, apparently, the US government is calling aliens. Aliens. That’s the latest. It had been vermin, now it’s aliens. I’m deeply ashamed of this, I want you to know. They belong to another category of human beings, as if their hopes and fears and aspirations were somehow less legitimate than our own. The simple truth that we’re all connected by movement, by our own humanity, by journeys that have come before for us.
Earlier in the week, Gere called Trump a “maniac” during a conversation with activist Thor Halvorssen at the Oslo Freedom Forum in Norway.
He described the current moment as the “darkest moment I have experienced on this planet.”
Richard and his wife left the United States and moved to Spain in 2024.
He also said, “I didn’t do enough to carefully convince people—those close to me and those not close to me—that it was crazy to elect this person as president of the United States.”
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