Comedian Stavros Halkias sat down with CBS Mornings for an extended interview where he talked about his approach to blending politics with comedy. During the conversation, Halkias took aim at entertainers who supported the Trump administration and are now distancing themselves from that decision without fully accounting for it.
Halkias said he generally keeps his own political opinions separate from his stand-up, but noted a shift in the cultural climate that has made silence harder to justify.
“I think particularly in standup, I think standup’s gotten a bit of a bad rep because I think a lot of people are starting to think of it as a right-wing art form only,” he said.
He pushed back on that framing while also calling out a specific pattern he has noticed among some public figures.
The host noted, “Some are being criticized for now having regrets about aligning themselves with the Trump administration and then coming out afterwards saying, well, I wasn’t quite sure about this. I didn’t know this was going to happen.”
For Halkias, the issue isn’t that people changed their minds. It’s that they haven’t been straightforward about it.
“Look, you’re allowed to make mistakes, right? You know what I mean? It’s totally fine. You’re allowed to reflect on those things,” he said.
He also drew a line between his job as an entertainer and the job of political accountability.
Halkias stated, “I do have strong political beliefs personally. I’ve never really thought that that’s my job. I feel like there’s much more qualified people. And I think ultimately my perspective on those things is… I just think if anybody’s talking to the president or a high-ranking government official, it should be really skilled journalists who can like actually hold them accountable.”
He pointed to his nephew as the reason he has grown more willing to speak up.
“There’s been a lot of discrimination. Gay, trans people have faced I think more discrimination. There’s a lot of anti-immigrant sentiment going on, and I’m a first-generation immigrant,” he said, adding that he wants to leave his nephew a better world.
Still, Halkias argued artists shouldn’t chase universal approval just to protect their audience or their business.
“I don’t think we should take a middle stance. I don’t think we should try and appeal to everybody. I think you make less interesting stuff that way,” he said, adding that he’d rather make the best art he can than maximize how much money or fame he collects along the way.
