Hollywood Walk of Fame official says Bill Cosby’s star won’t be removed and neither will Donald Trump’s
Bill Cosby, shown performing in 2013, admitted in a 2005 deposition that he obtained the drug Quaalude with the intent of using it to have sex with women.
No matter the controversy embroiling public figures, some still have a star to wish on -- courtesy of the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce has been questioned about whether it plans to remove stars of controversial public figures such as Donald Trump and Bill Cosby from the Hollywood Walk of Fame, but it’s taken a hard line.
“The answer is no,” Leron Gubler, Hollywood Chamber of Commerce president and chief executive, said in an emailed statement. “Once a star has been added to the Walk, it is considered a part of the historic fabric of the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Because of this, we have never removed a star from the Walk.”
In a letter addressed to the Chamber of Commerce, Earl Ofari Hutchinson of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable and Najee Ali of Project Islamic Hope asked for the removal of Cosby’s star.
The letter was prompted by the unsealing of a 2005 deposition this week in which Cosby admitted to obtaining Quaaludes with the intent of giving them to women he wanted to have sex with. Cosby also admitted to giving them to at least one woman.
“Drugging and rape are serious crimes and having a star on the walk honoring Cosby after his admissions of these acts is a gross slap at the industry and the public,” Hutchinson and Ali wrote in the letter.
Cosby was given a star in November 1977, according to the Walk of Fame’s website. Late last year, someone vandalized Cosby’s star, scrawling “rapist” across it three times in marker.
More than 45 women have accused Cosby of sexual misconduct dating to the late 1960s.
Project Islamic Hope and the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable will hold a news conference at 10 a.m. Thursday at King and Crenshaw boulevards.
Donald Trump is facing controversy of his own after making inflammatory comments about Mexican immigrants.
“They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists,” he said of Mexican immigrants, during the kickoff for his presidential campaign last month.
Macy’s, NBC and Univision have since cut ties with Trump.
For more California news, follow @brittny_mejia.
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