Sam Bee's Full Frontal tries to make amends for showing brain-cancer patient in CPAC 'Nazi haircut' joke

Full Frontal sent producer Mike Rubens to the Conservative Political Action Conference in February, and Samantha Bee played his report on Wednesday's show. The partly NSFW segment was meant as a half-serious anthropological look at the state of conservatism in President Trump's Republican Party. At last year's CPAC, the narrator notes, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) was king and Trump canceled his appearance, fearing a poor reception. "This year, the bow ties were gone and CPAC was decidedly Trump country." Rubens peppered CPAC participants with questions, and the narrator noted that not everyone was welcome: "CPAC boldly drew a line at Nazisim and pederasty."

YouTube

Watch On

Originally, the narrator had included this line: "This year, the bow ties were gone and replaced by Nazi hair," with a shot of a bunch of CPAC participants with a certain short-on-the-side, longer-on-top haircut The Washington Post refers to as the "fashy." But Full Frontal excised that part after Megan Coddington pointed out that not all "fashy"-nistas had chosen that style to showcase their white nationalist sympathies:

Kyle Coddington was diagnosed with stage four glioblastoma, "a very aggressive type of brain cancer," in December, according to a GoFundMe page posted by the conservative magazine he writes for, Outset. Bee responded to the tweet, telling Megan Coddington: "We deeply apologize for offending you and [Kyle]. We only learned of his condition today & have removed him from the piece."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Full Frontal executive producer Jo Miller told The Washington Post Thursday afternoon that the show had "apologized to Mr. Coddington and his family members," adding, "We wish him all the best in his fight against cancer and sincerely, deeply regret offending him and his family." Miller also said the show would donate to his treatment — and "Full Frontal with Samantha Bee" is currently the GoFundMe campaigns's largest donor, at $1,000.

Kyle Coddington, who appears to be neither a white nationalist nor a big Trump supporter, also asked that the "Nazi haircut" part be removed, but he did so with a bit more humor, tweeting, "I look like a balding potato," and: "Also, it's not a Nazi haircut. Richard Spencer's is, but mine's from cancer."