Sharon Osbourne is backing a campaign to rename Orange County's John Wayne Airport.
The former X Factor judge, 67, has told that she always wondered why the venue was named after the actor as there has "always been this reputation" that he was racist.
“It just gives me the creeps. There has always been this reputation of him of really hating blacks, Jews, anybody that wasn't white," she told the Daily Star.
“When the airport came, I was like, ‘Why would you give this man this honour of having an airport named after somebody like that, who is just a bad man, a really ugly man?'
"We cannot celebrate these people that we once thought were heroes.”
Democrats in Orange County are calling for the Wayne's name, statue and other likenesses to be removed from Santa Ana airport.
Movements have been made over the past number of weeks due to a number of unearthed “racist and bigoted statements” allegedly made by the actor.
The star, real name Marion Robert Morrison, was labelled as a white supremacist by Orange County officials who have passed an emergency resolution condemning him.
“There have been past efforts to get this done and now we're putting our name and our backing into this to make sure there is a name change,” said Ada Briceño, chair of the Democratic Party of Orange County.
According to those behind the calls for The Quiet Man star’s name to be removed, the campaign is part of “a national movement to remove white supremacist symbols and names reshaping American institutions, monuments, businesses, nonprofits, sports leagues and teams”.
The resolution insisted that the USA is a much more diverse place than it was when the airport was named after Wayne in 1979.
It has now called on the Orange County Board of Supervisors to drop his name and statue and to “restore its original name: Orange County Airport”.
It comes after a1971 interview with Playboy has been unearthed where the late Hollywood actor said he didn’t feel guilty about slavery.
John also accused Native Americans of “selfishly trying to keep” land for themselves.
The star insisted: “Our so-called stealing of this country from them was just a matter of survival.
“There were great numbers of people who needed new land, and the Indians were selfishly trying to keep it for themselves.”
The True Grit icon also stated: “With a lot of blacks, there’s quite a bit of resentment along with their dissent, and possibly rightfully so. But we can’t all of a sudden get down on our knees and turn everything over to the leadership of blacks.
“I believe in white supremacy until the blacks are educated to a point of responsibility.
“I don’t believe in giving authority and positions of leadership and judgement to irresponsible people,” he added in the distasteful remarks.
John died in June 1979 after a short battle with cancer.
Do you have a story to sell? Get in touch with us at webcelebs@trinitymirror.com or call us direct 0207 29 33033.
