Filmmaker Spike Lee said Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling reminds him of George Wallace or a plantation owner. 

Lee made his comments to Anderson Cooper after Cooper played an interview with Sterling in which he blasted Magic Johnson for getting HIV while sleeping with every women in every city while accusing Johnson of not giving back to the black community like Jews give back to the Jewish community.

“He’s messing with the wrong brother,” Lee said, before saying the Sterling interview reminded him of his interview with Wallace in which he spoke about buying “school books when black kids didn’t have school books.” Lee said Sterling was like the former Alabama governor who once said, “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.”

“It’s ludicrous,” Lee said. “This thing is getting volatile now.”

In response to Sterling’s assertion that his players loved him, Lee said Sterling had the mentality of a plantation owner who believes that, “my darkies love me. They’re not going to revolts.”

“Sounds like a plantation owner,” Lee said. “He’s delusional.” 

Lee said the NBA should expedite the sale of the Clippers because players have indicated they will not play if anybody associated with the Sterlings owns the team.
Lee has also been involved in racial controversies. He once said of interracial couples, “I give interracial couples a look. Daggers. They get uncomfortable when they see me on the street.” Lee also settled with an elderly Florida couple after he re-tweeted an address that he falsely believed to be was that of George Zimmerman’s after Trayvon Martin was killed.