I moved to the UK due to Donald Trump

US TV star Ellen DeGeneres has made her first public look since shifting to the UK, saying she determined to settle in England the day after Donald Trump was re-elected US president.

The comic and host instructed a crowd in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, that life “is simply higher” within the UK.

Ellen mentioned she and spouse Portia de Rossi had been contemplating getting married once more in England after some strikes within the US to reverse the fitting to homosexual marriage, and that America can nonetheless be “scary for folks to be who they’re”.

She additionally addressed allegations of a poisonous office that led to the top of her long-running chat present in 2022, admitting she might be “very blunt”, however dismissed the tales as “clickbait”.

Ellen was one of many largest names on US TV for 30 years, because of her daytime chat present, in addition to for her self-titled Nineties sitcom, for internet hosting the Oscars, Grammys and Emmys, and for voicing Dory in Discovering Nemo.

After her speak present was cancelled, she went on a “remaining stand-up tour” within the US 2024 then purchased a home within the Cotswolds, a historic and picturesque space primarily spanning components of Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire.

On Sunday on the Everyman theatre in close by Cheltenham, she was in dialog with broadcaster Richard Bacon, who requested whether or not stories that she moved due to Donald Trump had been right. “Sure,” she replied.

The 67-year-old mentioned she and De Rossi had initially deliberate to spend three or 4 months a 12 months within the UK and purchased what they thought could be “a part-time home”.

“We bought right here the day earlier than the election and woke as much as numerous texts from our mates with crying emojis, and I used to be like, ‘He bought in’,” she mentioned. “And we’re like, ‘We’re staying right here’.”

Ellen has been giving glimpses of her new rural life on social media, in movies exhibiting her livestock together with sheep – though they’ve now been offered after they stored escaping.

“It is completely lovely,” she mentioned. “We’re simply not used to seeing this sort of magnificence. The villages and the cities and the structure – every little thing you see is charming and it is only a less complicated lifestyle.

“It is clear. Every thing right here is simply higher – the way in which animals are handled, persons are well mannered. I simply adore it right here.

“We moved right here in November, which was not the best time, however I noticed snow for the primary time in my life. We adore it right here. Portia flew her horses right here, and I’ve chickens, and we had sheep for about two weeks.”

On her final tour, she joked that she had been “kicked out of present enterprise twice” – the primary time being when she got here out as homosexual in 1997.

That successfully led to the top of her sitcom after advertisers pulled out and the community stopped selling it, she instructed the Cheltenham crowd on Sunday.

Bacon requested whether or not her visibility had inspired different folks to return out. “I’d say no,” she replied. “I imagined lots of people popping out like meerkats poking out of a gap and going again in once more. ‘How’s she doing? OK, no, no.'”

However it’s “a very laborious resolution” that does not go well with everybody, she continued, and mentioned issues are higher right now “in some methods” however not others.

“If it was [better], all these different folks which can be actors and actresses that I do know they’re homosexual, they’d be out, however they don’t seem to be, as a result of it is nonetheless an issue. Individuals are nonetheless scared.”

Ellen additionally referenced a latest transfer by the Southern Baptist Conference to endorse the reversal of a Supreme Court docket case permitting same-sex marriage. A minimum of 9 state legislatures have launched payments to do the identical.

“The Baptist Church in America is making an attempt to reverse homosexual marriage,” she mentioned. “They’re making an attempt to actually cease it from taking place sooner or later and probably reverse it. Portia and I are already trying into it, and in the event that they try this, we’ll get married right here.”

Later, in response to an viewers query, she added: “I want we had been at a spot the place it was not scary for folks to be who they’re. I want that we lived in a society the place everyone might settle for different folks and their variations.

“So till we’re there, I feel there is a laborious place to say we now have enormous progress.”

Nonetheless, the youthful era are “extra comfy with it” and are “simply type of fluid”, she added. “So I feel the youthful era goes to point out us the way in which.”

After some former employees on her speak present made allegations of a poisonous office tradition, the star – who ended each episode by telling viewers to “be form to at least one one other” – was dubbed as “imply” within the media.

Following the scandal three producers had been sacked amid allegations of misconduct and sexual harassment, and the ultimate season of the present opened with Ellen giving an on-air apology.

She addressed that in her 2024 tour and the accompanying Netflix stand-up particular.

“It doesn’t matter what, any article that got here up, it was like, ‘She’s imply’, and it is like, how do I take care of this with out sounding like a sufferer or ‘poor me’ or complaining? However I wished to handle it.

“It is so simple as, I am a direct individual, and I am very blunt, and I assume generally that signifies that… I am imply?”

She additionally mentioned it was “type of loopy” that saying somebody is imply “will be the worst factor that you just say a few lady”.

“How dare us have any type of temper, or you possibly can’t be something aside from good and candy and type and submissive and complacent.”

She added: “I do not assume I can say something that is ever going to eliminate that [reputation] or dispel it, which is hurtful to me. I hate it. I hate that folks assume that I am that as a result of I do know who I’m and I do know that I am an empathetic, compassionate individual.”

It was “definitely an disagreeable strategy to finish” her speak present, she mentioned.

Ellen mentioned she misses “so much” about her present, however does not assume an identical format would work any extra.

“I imply, I want it did, as a result of I’d do the identical factor right here. I’d love to try this once more, however I simply really feel like persons are watching on their telephones, or folks aren’t actually paying consideration as a lot to televisions, as a result of we’re so inundated with with data and leisure.”

She mentioned she did not know what she would do sooner or later, however would decide her subsequent transfer “very fastidiously”.

“I simply do not know what that’s but,” she mentioned. “I need to have enjoyable, I need to do one thing. I do like my chickens however I am slightly bit bored.”