John Leguizamo says he’s a “DEI hire,” as he made an appeal at the Emmy Awards for greater diversity and representation in Hollywood.
“I’m John Leguizamo and I’m one of Hollywood’s DEI hires,” Leguizamo said as he took to the Emmys stage in Los Angeles on Sunday.
“That’s right DEI: The ‘d’ is for diligence, the ‘e’ is for excellence, and the ‘i’ is for imagination,” the “John Wick” actor said.
“So we are all DEI hires,” Leguizamo told the Emmys audience.
Earlier this year, several GOP lawmakers cited Vice President Harris’s gender and race to argue that she is unqualified, calling her a diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) hire.
As a teenager, Leguizamo said, he “didn’t know the word ‘representation,’” and “saw a lot of brownface,” citing Al Pacino taking on the role of a Cuban gangster in 1983’s “Scarface” and Marlon Brando “playing a Mexican” in the 1952 film, “Viva Zapata!”
“Everybody played us, except us,” Leguizamo, the star of Broadway’s “Latin History for Morons,” said.