Kevin Hart has been busy scrubbing his Twitter account of his old anti-gay tweets since he was tapped as Oscar host earlier this week.
And just hours after deleting the tweets, Hart stepped down as host of the Oscars with an apology.
“I have made the choice to step down from hosting this year’s Oscar’s….this is because I do not want to be a distraction on a night that should be celebrated by so many amazing talented artists,” Hart said in a statement. “I sincerely apologize to the LGBTQ community for my insensitive words from my past.”
The imbroglio started after Guardian editor Benjamin Lee tweeted out screen grabs of some of Hart’s now-deleted messages on Twitter, including one from 2011 in which he wrote: “Yo if my son comes home & try’s 2 play with my daughters doll house I’m going 2 break it over his head & say n my voice ‘stop that’s gay.”