Roseanne Barr said she was sorry -- but then went on a Twitter spree deflecting blame from the racist comment that got her show canceled

Travis Clark
  • Roseanne Barr went on a tweetstorm Tuesday night after ABC canceled the “Roseanne” reboot.
  • Barr said Tuesday morning that she was leaving Twitter, but she continued to tweet and retweet throughout the night.
  • The retweets included right-wing Twitter pages and pundits defending her after her racist remark.

ABC may have canceled its “Roseanne” reboot on Tuesday over one of Roseanne Barr’s tweets, but that didn’t stop Barr from tweeting throughout the night.

Barr earlier Tuesday sent out a tweet comparing Valerie Jarrett, who served as a senior adviser to President Barack Obama, to an ape: “muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj.” Jarrett is a black woman born in Iran.

Barr tweeted an apology Tuesday morning: “I apologise to Valerie Jarrett and to all Americans. I am truly sorry for making a bad joke about her politics and her looks. I should have known better. Forgive me-my joke was in bad taste.”

But by Wednesday morning, after Barr had said she was leaving Twitter and after ABC then pulled the plug on Barr’s show, her Twitter account was littered with retweets from fans, far-right Twitter pages, and conservative pundits defending her following the racist remark.

Barr at one point sent out a tweet seeming to ask her followers to back off: “Hey guys, don’t defend me, it’s sweet of you 2 try, but…losing my show is 0 compared 2 being labelled a racist over one tweet-that I regret even more.”

But both before and after that tweet, Barr also retweeted Twitter users who defended her:

https://twitter.com/JodiJodiBoBodi/status/1001612666513719296?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

https://twitter.com/ThomasWictor/status/1001659571641827328?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

She replied to the television and radio host David Pakman and called him a “bully” while defending her claim that Ambien caused her racist tweet.

She also referred to several people as “bigots” for calling her out.

She responded to her costar Sara Gilbert’s tweet describing Barr’s tweet about Jarrett as “abhorrent.”

But then she said she understood Gilbert’s position and was just “shocked.”

She also called out Wanda Sykes for quitting the show before ABC canceled it, and she called out her costar Michael Fishman, who she said threw her under the bus.

Barr also tweeted a defence of President Donald Trump, saying she “feels bad” for him in response to a tweet that called Gilbert “ungrateful” and “disloyal.”

Barr also retweeted a claim by Herman Cain on a Fox Business program that ABC was “looking for a reason to cancel” the show because the network’s executives “didn’t like the fact that her conservative defence of certain things was so popular.”

ABC executives have said the “Roseanne” revival was a direct result of Trump’s election and part of the network’s strategy to attract conservatives. And while ratings slightly decreased since the reboot’s premiere in March, it was still the most popular scripted show of the year.

Barr also seemed to be deflecting attention from her own remarks with a series of retweets that called out other personalities.

https://twitter.com/CeJayC/status/1001741018767638529?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

https://twitter.com/bapartofmylife/status/1001797885179125761?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

Barr got into other political issues during her tweetstorm as well, such as the controversy surrounding photos of locked-up immigrant children.

The former Obama staffer Jon Favreau accidentally attributed photos of the children to Trump’s administration, but the photos were actually from 2014. Favreau apologised on Twitter for the mistake.

That didn’t stop Barr from retweeting a Breitbart article on the topic.

And she took part in the NFL controversy by retweeting the conservative commentator Ben Shapiro.

She also retweeted numerous tweets about the Palestinian bombing of Israel on Tuesday.

To cap it off, she retweeted Charlie Sheen, who joked that “Two and a Half Men” should make a comeback.

Business Insider Emails & Alerts

Site highlights each day to your inbox.

Follow Business Insider Australia on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.