Actor Kal Penn, best known for his lead roles in Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, and as the former Associate Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement under President Barack Obama, is still working away and in the public eye. A few days ago he received a particularly hateful tweet to go along with Donald Trump’s kumbaya-style Executive Order to ban muslims from 7 countries. Penn said to himself that while he was a “relatively privileged guy,” and he could easily let this roll off his back, the younger him or someone not in his position might feel understandably isolated by this kind of misguided anger.
So he set up a crowdfunding site for Syrian refugees, hoping to raise a few thousand dollars.
Campaign Action
He reached his original goal in twenty minutes and as he told reporters today, he’s had to continue to up this goal into the stratosphere—because most people aren’t shitheels. Most people understand that banning people from our country who have had considerably more serious “vetting” done to them than any single one of the people in Trump’s staff or cabinet posts, is un-American.
As the cash continued to pour in — some people made donations under names like “Chief Strategist Steve Bannon,” “#Saynotobigotry,” “Tiny Trump Hands,” “Paul Ryan’s Lost Testicles,” “Mike Pence,” and “Donald ClownfaceVonf---stick Trump” — Penn gave updates on Twitter as he also continued to raise the goal.
The campaign had raised over half a million dollars — more than 90 per cent of its new $600,000 goal — by Monday morning. By Monday afternoon, that had been surpassed and the goal was set for $650,000.