Katt Williams makes first donation to help Arsenio Hall buy the Los Angeles Clippers

Comedian Katt Williams has helped to kickstart actor-turned-talk show host Arsenio Hall’s crowdfunding campaign to raise $1 billion to buy the Los Angeles Clippers basketball team after donating $1,600 (£1,000) in cash. The sports team’s owner, Donald Sterling, is facing having to sell the franchise after he was banned for life from the National Basketball Association (NBA) for making racist remarks that were caught on tape.
A number of celebrities, including Oprah Winfrey, rap moguls Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs and Dr. Dre, boxing champ Floyd Mayweather, Jr. and actress Whoopi Goldberg have all expressed an interest in buying the team, and now Hall has thrown his hat into the ring, too.
The Coming to America star announced his plans at the start of The Arsenio Hall Show on Thursday (01May14), when he unveiled a campaign video, in which he reveals it has been a dream of his to own a professional basketball team since he was a little boy.
In the promo, he says, “The Clippers deserve a better owner. They deserve an owner who will represent everybody. There’s only one problem, I ain’t got a billion dollars…! I want you to bet on me… You buy it, I’ll run it. Let me put your money where my mouth is.”
After the video, which appeared to be a spoof, aired, Hall insisted he was “serious about this”, adding, “We’re gonna do this together, that’s why I’m starting the Help Arsenio Buy The Clippers (crowdfunding) campaign.”
He brought the topic up during an interview with his guest Williams and brazenly asked for a donation.
Williams happily obliged, and proceeded to pull out a wad of $100 bills to hand over to his stunned pal.
The funnyman admitted he wanted to donate more, but couldn’t afford to due to his ongoing tax problems, quipping, “My business partners at the IRS (U.S. tax authorities Internal Revenue Service) have authorised me to put $1,600 into whatever you plan on doing. (It’s) not much… (but) we are in the Clipper business!”
Williams has been slowly paying off his tax debt after being hit with a $3.2 million (£2 million) bill stemming from 2008, as well as another $829,352 (£518,345) invoice from the following year (09).