Bill Burr defends ‘hilarious’ wife after she caused controversy by aiming obscene gesture at Donald Trump during UFC 295
Comedian Bill Burr has played down his wife’s viral interaction with Donald Trump.
The 45th U.S. president received the biggest cheer of the night when he arrived at Madison Square Garden in New York for UFC 295 last weekend.
A round of applause echoed around the iconic venue during his grand entrance before chants of ‘USA’ erupted when he finally sat down alongside UFC CEO Dana White, musician Kid Rock and political commentator Tucker Carlson.
Although most of the crowd was pro-Trump, the TV-star-turned-politician’s presence was not well received by everyone in attendance.
Nia Renée Hill, who has been married to Burr since 2013, was caught on camera flipping off Trump with both her middle fingers and footage of the incident quickly circulated on social media.
The mother of two upset many by aiming a disrespectful gesture at Trump.
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One person tweeted: “Classless.”
Another wrote: “Trashy is as trashy does.”
Others found Hill’s antics amusing, while many more thought her gesture was aimed at the camera, not the divisive political figure standing in front of her.
Someone else commented: “That's funny!”
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A fourth person said: “She was flipping the camera off. She was just being spicy.”
Burr leapt to his wife’s defence when he was quizzed about the incident for the first time during a recent appearance on The Rich Eisen Show.
“I love my wife, you know where you stand with her,” he said.
“The guy walked into the arena, everybody cheered, she gave him the finger, nobody got arrested. That’s why this country's great!
"Everybody expressed themselves. Can we all be adults?
“I came there to go to the fights. I didn't know I was going to the Republican National Convention."
Burr concluded the conversation by branding his wife ‘hilarious’ and laughing off the incident as a funny moment, although not everyone viewed it as such.