Karamo Brown Explains the Intense Death Threats His Son Received After 'DWTS' Sean Spicer Backlash

Karamo Brown
Dave Kotinsky/Getty Images for Planet Hollywood International

The 'Queer Eye' star opens up about one of his sons getting chased in Philadelphia following the 'DWTS' cast reveal.

Karamo Brown and his children, sons Jason and Chris, received backlash after he joined the cast of Dancing With the Stars alongside controversial former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer. Now, the Queer Eye star is revealing just how intense the public reaction was.

During the latest podcast episode of NAKED With Catt Sadler, Brown opened up about his sons "literally getting death threats."

"We were in Philadelphia at the time and one of my sons was with me as we were shooting season five," he recalled. "He was running home because somebody was in a car chasing after him in the car screaming at him, 'F you and your dad! You're going to die!' My son at that point had no idea what was going on because he wasn't keeping up; the last thing he wants to do is read about me."

"So, he was confused as to why someone was chasing him in their car, and screaming things at him," he continued, adding that "it was like a seven-minute run" for his son. "That's what I don't like. That's the part that really makes me emotional and gets me upset. Where I have to squeeze my hands, because the Daddy protective in me is just like, 'Don't do that.'"

Brown said that's "exactly" why he temporarily deactivated his Twitter account and disabled Instagram comments at the time.

"The hate started coming at me. And normally I can handle the hate, because I'm OK with having constructive conversations, but what I realized is that places like Twitter, you can't have constructive conversations," he explained. "It's the mob mentality. And so once the mob feels like they have their target, they're going to get you."

"And then it was really the first tweet I saw where they @ my child as well, I was like, done! And I got off of it," he added. "Most parents don't know how to have conversations with their kids about social media ... they don't really know how to teach them about the mob mentality or 'cancel' culture or how it can really affect your self-esteem. There's so many things, so I really had to go back and do another re-learning with my kids of like, 'This is how we're going to handle this.' No geo-tagging or any of those things, because people will find you."

Despite all the backlash he received, especially after calling Spicer "a good guy" following a brief discussion they had, Brown said he doesn't regret that tweet. 

"To be honest with you, I understood why people got upset," he said. "I am not delusional. You know, seeing someone lie to the American public and be a part of an administration that is hurting us, it was bad. But in the moment it was, 'OK, here's a chance for me to sort of [discuss this]."

"First of all, I was sort of caught off guard, because none of us knew he was on the cast, I'm going to be very honest with you," he added. "I walked in the room and I was like, 'Oh. Umm, this is odd.' I was expecting, like, Charo, I wasn't expecting this person. But my natural instinct is to be kind to every human being. I literally said, 'I don't want to talk to you about politics right now because I'd like to get to know you really quickly, so that we can then grow to have a respectful conversation where we can talk about this. ... It was maybe a three-minute interaction."

Earlier this month, ET spoke with Spicer and his pro partner, Lindsay Arnold, shortly after he made his DWTS debut, where they opened up about how they're dealing with the backlash this season.

"It is going to be natural to see tons of people having comments about what we're doing," Arnold said. "But what I love about this show is that so many different people come together and enjoy what we do and have fun, and that's what I wanted to do this entire season."

"We're already having fun and we're going to continue to do that," she added. 

Hear more in the video below.

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