Papa Pope is dishing out some words of wisdom.
Days after South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley said its time to remove the Confederate flag, Scandal's Joe Morton appeared on The Nightly Show With Larry Whitmore, where the host asked the 67-year-old star how his character on the hit political drama would react to the current debate.
And in true Eli Pope fashion, the actor did not disappoint, delivering a passionate monologue that caused the hosts to burst into laughter.
"You are some funny, funny people. For you it's always summertime and the living is easy," he said, borrowing the hit tune's lyrics to further his point. "Your daddy's rich and your momma's good looking. You're a Confederate, a proud Southern white boy with a Bible in your hand and a shotgun in your pickup truck. A southern white boy with the shame of slavery running through your veins. You are a bigot."
Of course, he didn't stop there.
"I am a black man. I have worked and scraped for every inch of dirt I walk on," he said, staying in character. "You cried yourself to sleep because Lincoln hurt your feelings."
He then raised his voice with even more fervor and said he's "disappointed" in the country's current environment as the hosts got serious and nodded in approval.
"You back wood sheet wearing cross burning motherf--ker. You lose the war and all you want to do is make my people pay for it," he said. "You think you love this country, what you love is that corruption of the red, white and blue you call valor. What you love is the satisfaction that mess brings when people feel they need to give that flag some credence like it stands for something more than hate. You're fighting about whether to take it down from the top of your state building or not. You are a bigot and I'm disappointed in the way you treat my country."
Meanwhile, the South Carolina legislature is currently debating whether to remove the Confederate flag from the state capital. The issue recently gained national attention after the horrific church shooting in South Carolina, which left nine people dead.
"Today we are here in a moment of unity in our state without ill will to say it is time to remove the flag from our capitol grounds," Haley said in an address in the lobby of the statehouse on Monday. "We are not going to allow this symbol to divide us any longer."
She added: "This flag, while an integral part of our past, does not represent the future of our great state."
In the wake of the Charleston tragedy, a number of retailers, including Walmart, Sears, Amazon, eBay, Google and Etsy, have stopped selling merchandise that displays the Confederate flag.