DeGeneres Claps Back at Critics on Sitting With Bush at Game

Ellen DeGeneres clapped back criticism Tuesday for sitting with former President George W. Bush in a private box Sunday's game between the Dallas Cowboys and the Green Bay Packers, explaining that "we've forgotten that it's okay that we're all different."

"During the game, they showed a shot of George W. Bush and I laughing together — and people were upset," the talk-show host explained in a nearly four-minute monologue. "They thought, 'Why was a gay Hollywood liberal sitting next to a conservative Republican president?'

"A lot of people were mad," DeGeneres continued, "and they did what they do when people were mad: they tweet."

DeGeneres said she and her wife, Portia de Rossi, were invited to sit in the box of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones at the AT&T Stadium near Dallas by his daughter, Charlotte Jones.

Former first lady Laura Bush sat next to her husband in the box.

"When we were invited, I was aware that we would be surrounded by people with different views and beliefs," DeGeneres said. "And I'm not talking about politics. I was rooting for the Packers," who won, 34-24.

In discussing the Twitter backlash, DeGeneres put up one post on the screen behind her that she said she loved: "It says, 'Ellen and George Bush together makes me have faith in America again.'"

She continued: "Here's the thing: I'm friends with George Bush.

"In fact, I'm friends with a lot of people who don't share the same beliefs that I have," DeGeneres said. "We're all different.

"I think that we've forgotten that it's okay that we're all different.

"But just because I don't agree with someone on everything doesn't mean that I'm not going to be friends with them," DeGeneres said.

"When I say, 'be kind to one another,' I don't mean only the people that think the same way that you do. I mean, be kind to everyone."

A Bush spokesman told TMZ Tuesday that the former president was not aware of the backlash until DeGeneres' monologue but that he supported her remarks "especially on being kind to folks with views that are different than your own."

But some Twitter fans still weren't having it, including Ded Darken: "That's a long-winded way to admit to the world you're a morally bankrupt shell of a human being."

However, Missouri Dave countered: "As a fervent Trump supporter, thanks for saying this.  Yes, we can be kind to one another, even when we disagree.  We need more of this from Hollywood."

And former Wisconsin Republican Scott Walker tweeted: "classy."

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