“Emilia Pérez” star Karla Sofía Gascón’s controversial posts on X, covering topics like Muslims, George Floyd, Oscars diversity, and more, are making waves online.
“This is wild. Karla Sofía Gascón still has these tweets up? I’ve honestly never seen such blatantly racist tweets from someone actively campaigning for an ACADEMY AWARD. And there’s more than a dozen of them…” journalist Sarah Hagi tweeted on Thursday, sharing multiple screenshots.
“This is from the lead in a movie promoting progressive values—honestly, you can’t help but laugh. Stuff like this doesn’t get flagged because you can say anything about Muslims, and it’s never considered racist. This isn’t even all of them,” Hagi continued, uploading even more posts.
“I’m not exaggerating when I say there are so many tweets—spanning years!! It’s just unbelievable.”
The posts from Gascón, who made history earlier this month as the first openly transgender person to be nominated for an Oscar, date from May 2016 to April 2023. Among them, the 52-year-old Spanish actress posted, “Islam is becoming a breeding ground for infection that humanity urgently needs to cure” and called Muslims “a DEEP DISGUSTING HUMANITY.”
She also wrote, “Is it just me, or are there more Muslims in Spain? Every time I pick up my daughter from school, I see more women with their hair covered and their skirts to the ground. Next year, instead of English, we’ll probably be teaching Arabic.”
Gascón argued that Islam “fails to comply with international human rights” and “must be banned if it doesn’t align with DDHH,” the abbreviation for human rights under Spanish law.
Earlier this month, she made history as the first openly transgender Oscar nominee. Courtesy Everett Collection
In another post, she expressed her frustration, saying, “I’m so tired of all of this—Islam, Christianity, Catholicism, and all the idiotic beliefs that violate human rights.”
During the Black Lives Matter protests following the death of George Floyd—a Black man killed by a white police officer in broad daylight—Gascón posted, “I honestly think very few people ever cared about George Floyd, a drug addict and scam artist. His death, however, has once again shown that there are people who still consider Black people to be monkeys with no rights, and police officers to be murderers. They’re all wrong.”
In a follow-up post, she remarked, “So many things to reflect on when an event like this happens. Maybe it’s not just racism, but class struggles that make people feel threatened by each other. Maybe that’s the only real difference.”
After the 2021 Academy Awards, when Nomadland won Best Picture, she tweeted, “The Oscars are increasingly becoming a ceremony for indie and protest films. I wasn’t sure if I was watching an Afro-Korean festival, a Black Lives Matter demonstration, or the 8M. The gala was just plain ugly.”
During the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Gascón shared, “So many scientists working on bombs, so many scholars building space tech, so many pharmaceutical factories, and yet no one can get on top of this Chinese s–t. In the end, it’s just a massive show for some new flu variant, whether avian or coronavirus.”
She also quipped, “The Chinese vaccine, apart from the mandatory chip, comes with two spring rolls, a cat that moves its paw, 2 plastic flowers, a pop-up lantern, 3 telephone lines, and one euro for your first controlled purchase.”
In response to the backlash, she issued an apology through a statement from her representative, saying, “I want to acknowledge the conversation around my past social media posts that have caused harm. As someone from a marginalized community, I know this pain all too well and I am deeply sorry to anyone I’ve hurt. I’ve always fought for a better world, and I believe light will always triumph over darkness.”
