Howard Stern Under Fire For Use of Blackface and N-Word in Resurfaced Clips

Howard Stern came under fire as past sketches of him in blackface and using the N-word resurfaced online recently.

The Sirius XM host can be seen wearing dark makeup on his face in four separate examples, with two of them showing the shock jock's use of the racially offensive term.

In one skit, Stern imitates Supreme Court Judge Clarence Thomas and wears a prosthetic nose, prosthetic lips and an Afro wig while being interviewed by his sidekick Robin Quivers.

One Twitter user reposted a YouTube video of Stern from a 1993 New Year's Eve show in minstrel-style cosmetics alongside a 2019 clip of him on "The View" arguing with host Sunny Hostin, who said she was offended by his past use of the N-word on his FM radio show.

Stern's FM radio show, "The Howard Stern Show," ran on WXRK between 1986 and 2005.

"I didn't use the N-word, let's be very clear," Stern told Hostin, before the video cuts to him on the New Year's Eve sketch with intermittent clips of him using the N-word on his radio program several times on different occasions.

The 1993 skit appeared to mimic Ted Danson's infamous blackface performance of the same year with then-girlfriend Whoopi Goldberg, as the late "The Jefferson'" star, Sherman Hemsley, played Goldberg in full costume with a braided wig.

In it, Stern's character makes several racist jokes, drops the N-word and even calls Quivers a "smelly" N-word. In attempts to excuse his character's behavior, Stern repeatedly says, "Whoopi wrote it!"

Many online users denounced Stern, as one Twitter user posted, "Wow. I knew that @howardstern was a pig, but this is so blatantly disgusting. I've never seen this before. I hope people will retweet this far and wide and expose him and his own hypocrisy. Howard Stern is a #racist."

However, some fans argued that he only used the derogatory term when he was playing a character or when he was explaining how the word was used among the Black community.

One follower posted about the New Year's Eve skit, saying, "Although this is in poor taste, he's imitating someone that did that. Context matters. Still, this is s--t-tons racist and inappropriate... but it's Howard Stern doing a racist bit. It's not Howard Stern being racist. (See also: Jimmy Fallon, Robert Downey, Jimmy Kimmel)"

Steve Grillo -- who worked on the New Year's Eve program -- told Page Six he doesn't believe Stern is racist and that Stern "never used that language off-air."

As the show was pay-per-view and not under FCC restrictions, Grillo said the production felt like they should "push the limits."

TooFab has reached out to Stern for comment.