For a Muslim American stand-up, than can be few better comedic breaks than being upgraded on an international flight and finding yourself sitting next to Donald Trump’s second son. Especially, if it happens while the president-elect is rumoured to be planning to introduce a so-called Muslim travel ban.
Mohammed “Mo” Amer immediately recognised both the unlikeliness, and comic potential of the moment. After asking Eric Trump to pose with him for a selfie, Amer quickly posted the image on social media, with the words: “Good news guys Muslims will not have to check in and get IDs. That’s what I was told. I will be asking him a lot of questions on this trip to Glasgow, Scotland. Sometimes God just sends you the material.” The post very quickly went viral.
Two years on, and with a travel ban against several Muslim-majority nations in place after a bitter legal fight over Executive Order 13780, Amer still scratches his head over his encounter with Trump on that flight from Newark to Glasgow, and the upgrade he jokes must have been arranged by a “Hillary Clinton supporter”.
It was “a surreal experience”, he tells The Independent, saying that Trump’s son told him not too believe “everything you read”, but who did not flinch as he was quizzed about the threats his father had made on the White House campaign trail to ban Muslims from entering the US.
In many respects, the description of the encounter en route to Scotland to begin a UK tour - painfully awkward, honest and brutally funny - sums up a large part of much of Amer’s approach to comedy, as he reveals the travails and challenges of migrants to America, especially Muslims.
As a stand-up who has spent several years opening for Dave Chappelle, he says he tries not to derive too much of his material from Donald Trump - “he does not deserve that much attention” - who is a constant and rich source for many comedians. Yet, he cannot ignore the greater insecurity felt by by friends and relatives, and the poor international perception of the US, since the president’s election win. “We’re supposed to be the global example.”
The 37-year-old recently recorded a live show at Austin’s Paramount Theatre for a Netflix special, The Vagabond. In it, hopping around the stage and constantly dabbing at his brow, Amer recalls the years spent travelling the world as a comedian with only a “travel document” rather than a passport, entertaining US and coalition troops in Iraq and Kuwait, and trying to explain to Japanese immigration officials his profession. (The only US comedian they had heard of was the disgraced Bill Cosby.)
One of Amer’s talents is a gift for mimicry and accents - a British customs official, a US soldier from Alabama, the Chinese-American woman who is thrilled when he finally wins citizenship, the Latino Houston gang member who cannot decide whether he is one of them or not. All are voices and personas he deploys, apparently without offending anyone, and which people of different ethnic backgrounds are able to laugh out loud at.
Speaking Arabic and Spanish, as well as English, helps. So does his conversational, almost confessional style. Somehow, an entire theatre can laugh, as he mimics himself threatening to blow up a plane as he recalls heaving with frustration being forced to go through the same ritual of his travel document not being recognised every time he flew.
“It was just something I did. It was not something I ever practiced,” Amer says of ability to switch from (mock) British, to (mock) German to real Houstonian. “I just did it. And I started doing different ones, and they worked.”
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Police officers and rescuers work at the site of where a truck ploughed into cars at a toll booth in Lanzhou in China’s northwestern Gansu province. The out-of-control truck crashed into a 31-car lineup and killed 15 people, with 44 injured
AFP/Getty
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EPA
A supporter of Workers’ Party presidential candidate Fernando Haddad embraces a fellow weeping supporter, after learning that rival Jair Bolsonaro was declared the winner in the Brazil presidential runoff election. Addressing supporters in Sao Paulo, Haddad did not concede or even mention Bolsonaro by name. Instead, his speech was a promise to resist
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First responders surround the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, where a shooter opened fire, wounding three police officers and killing eleven
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Broward County Sheriff’s office have released a photo of Cesar Sayoc, the suspect who was arrested in connection with the pipe bombs that have been sent to several high profile Democrats and critics of President Trump over the course of this week
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East Island in Hawaii has been swallowed by the sea following Hurricane Walaka
US Fish and Wildlife Service
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CNA/AFP/Getty
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AFP/Getty
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Ecuador has issued a list of rules to Julian Assange, the famous resident of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. The list included cleaning the bathroom, not commenting on foreign political affairs online and taking better care of his cat (pictured). The document states that failure to comply with these rules “could lead to the termination of the diplomatic asylum granted by the Ecuadorian state”
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Israeli soldiers hurl tear gas grenades during clashes following Israeli order to shut down the al-Lubban/al-Sawiyeh school near the west bank city of Nablus, 15 October 2018. According to local sources, 20 Palestinians were wounded during clashes as dozens try to defiance the Israeli order to shut down the school
EPA
Serbia’s Novak Djokovic kisses the trophy after winning his men’s final singles match against Croatia’s Borna Coric at the Shanghai Masters. Djokovic, who has now won four titles this season, will move up one ranking spot to No. 2, pushing Roger Federer back to No. 3
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Demonstrators raising red painted hands and a placard reading “we must change the system not the climate” referring to the need to stop climate change during a march in Bordeaux, southwestern France
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Spanish Unionist demonstrators carry Spanish flags during a demonstration on Spain’s National Day in Barcelona
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Russia has halted all crewed space flights following the failed launch of the Soyuz MS-10 rocket (pictured). Investigations in to the rocket’s malfunction are ongoing
Reuters
People look on at a damaged store after Hurricane Michael passed through Panama City, Florida. A Category 4 storm, with maximum sustained winds of 155 mph, was the most powerful storm ever to hit the Florida Panhandle
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Paddy Dowling
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Supporters of Jair Bolsonaro, presidential candidate with the Social Liberal Party, celebrate in front of his house during the general elections in Rio. The far-right congressman, who waxes nostalgically about the dictatorship, won the vote but not an outright victory. The second-round-run-off will be between Bolsoanro and the leftist Workers’ party Fernando Haddad
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Quake survivors make their way past a washed out passenger ferry in Wani, Indonesia’s Central Sulawesi, after an earthquake and tsunami hit the area on September 28. Nearly 1,400 people are now known to have died as UN officials warned the “needs remain vast” for both desperate survivors and rescue teams still searching for victims
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AFP/Getty
A view of the Fuego volcano eruption at sunrise, seen from El Rodeo, Escuintla, Guatemala. More than 2,000 people were evacuated from several villages due to the strong eruption, located 50 kilometers west of the Guatemalan capital
EPA
French President Emmanuel Macron is applauded after speaking before the Bundestag (lower house of parliament) as the German parliament commemorates victims of wars and dictatorships in Berlin. The leaders of France and Germany jointly remember the victims of European wars, presenting also a united front in countering global turmoil stoked by US President Donald Trump
AFP/Getty
People wearing yellow vests, a symbol of a French drivers’ nationwide protest against higher fuel prices, block the Paris-Brussels motorway in Haulchin, France
Reuters
People hold banners of Jamal Khashoggi during a symbolic funeral prayer for the Saudi journalist, killed and dismembered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October, at the courtyard of Fatih mosque in Istanbul. Turkey has more evidence contradicting the Saudi version of the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi including a second audio recording, revealing that the murder had been premeditated, a Turkish newspaper reported on November 16, a contradiction to the statement of the Saudi prosecutor who said that five Saudi officials faced the death penalty on charges of killing Khashoggi but exonerated the country’s powerful Crown Prince of involvement in the murder
AFP/Getty
Alexei Navalny leaves the European Court of Human Rights today. The court has ruled that Russia’s repeated arrests of Navalny were politically motivated
AP
A crew member escorts a migrant child out of a plane transporting a group of 51 migrants from Niger, entitled to international protection, after its landing at the Mario De Bernardi military airport in Pratica di Mare, south of Rome
AFP/Getty
Palestinians gather in front of damaged buildings in Gaza City following Israeli air strikes targeting the area overnight. Israel’s aircraft struck Gaza on November 12, killing three Palestinians and wounding nine after a barrage of rocket fire into its territory from the enclave. The flare-up came after a deadly Israeli special forces operation in the Gaza Strip, at the weekend, that left Hamas vowing revenge
AFP/Getty
Floral tributes outside Melbourne’s Pellegrini’s Cafe for Sisto Malaspina, after he was stabbed to death last Friday in an attack police have called an act of terrorism, in Australia
Reuters
Heads of states and world leaders attend ceremonies at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. Over 60 heads of state and government were taking part in a solemn ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, the mute and powerful symbol of sacrifice to the millions who died from 1914-18
AP
Firefighters push down a wall while battling against a burning apartment complex in Paradise, north of Sacramento, California. A rapidly spreading, late-season wildfire in northern California has burned 20,000 acres of land and prompted authorities to issue evacuation orders for thousands of people. As many as 1000 homes, a hospital, a Safeway store and scores of other structures have burned in the area as the Camp fire tore through the region
AFP/Getty
A Fly Jamaica plane en route to Toronto crash lands at an airport in Guyana following a technical problem. At least six passengers were injured
Cheddi Jagan International Airport
An FBI agent talks to a potential witness as they stand near the scene Thursday in Thousand Oaks, California. where a gunman opened fire Wednesday inside a country dance bar crowded with hundreds of people on “college night,” wounding 11 people including a deputy who rushed to the scene. Ventura County sheriff’s spokesman says gunman is dead inside the bar.
AP
Democratic congressional candidate Ilhan Omar is celebrates with her husband’s mother after she won a congress place during the US midterm elections. In doing do she became the first-joint Muslim woman to be elected into congress alongside Rashida Tlaib
Reuters
Voters cast their ballots at the Tuttle Park Recreation Center polling location in Columbus, Ohio. Across the US, voters headed to the polls in one of the most high-profile midterm elections in years
AP
Members of the group Your Vote Matters encourage people to vote before an event hosted by US Senator Claire McCaskill as she campaigns for the US Senate in Saint Louis, Missour. McCaskill, a Democrat, faces a challenge from Republican Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley in the November general election
EPA
Police officers and rescuers work at the site of where a truck ploughed into cars at a toll booth in Lanzhou in China’s northwestern Gansu province. The out-of-control truck crashed into a 31-car lineup and killed 15 people, with 44 injured
AFP/Getty
Simone Biles on the podium with her gold medal from the floor exercise at the gymnastics world championships. She became the most decorated female gymnast in world’s history, as well as, becoming the first American to win a medal in every event at the competition
AFP/Getty
A Salvadorean migrant with a girl walks next to Guatemalan policemen as they approach the Guatemala-Mexico international border bridge in Ciudad Tecun Uman. Accoring to the Salvadorean General Migration Directorate, over 1,700 Salvadoreans left the country in two caravans and entered Guatemala Wednesday, in an attempt to reach the US
AFP/Getty
Google employees hold signs outside 14th street park after walking out as part of a global protest over claims of sexual harassment, gender inequality and systemic racism at the tech giant
Reuters
The “Statue of Unity” portraying Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, one of the founding fathers of India, during its inauguration in Kevadia, in the western state of Gujarat, India
Reuters
A scavenger collects recyclable materials along the breakwater amid strong waves as weather patterns from Typhoon Yutu affect Manila Bay. Fierce winds sheared off roofs and snapped trees in half, after thousands were evacuated ahead of the powerful storm’s arrival
AFP/Getty
Rescue team members collecting the remains of the crashed plane at Tanjung Priok Harbour, Indonesia. A Lion Air flight JT-610 lost contact with air traffic controllers soon after takeoff then crashed into the sea. The flight was en route to Pangkal Pinang, and reportedly had 189 people onboard
EPA
A supporter of Workers’ Party presidential candidate Fernando Haddad embraces a fellow weeping supporter, after learning that rival Jair Bolsonaro was declared the winner in the Brazil presidential runoff election. Addressing supporters in Sao Paulo, Haddad did not concede or even mention Bolsonaro by name. Instead, his speech was a promise to resist
AP
First responders surround the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, where a shooter opened fire, wounding three police officers and killing eleven
AP
Broward County Sheriff’s office have released a photo of Cesar Sayoc, the suspect who was arrested in connection with the pipe bombs that have been sent to several high profile Democrats and critics of President Trump over the course of this week
AP
East Island in Hawaii has been swallowed by the sea following Hurricane Walaka
US Fish and Wildlife Service
Police officers stand outside the home of former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton after a “functional explosive device” was attemptedly delivered to the couple
AP
Turkey’s President Erdogan today accused Saudi Arabia of plotting the ‘savage’ murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi
AP
Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison (C) delivers a national apology to child sex abuse victims in the House of Representatives in Parliament House in Canberra on October 22, 2018. - Morrison on October 22 issued an emotive apology to children who suffered sexual abuse, saying the state had failed to protect them from “evil dark” crimes committed over decades
AFP/Getty
A derailed train in Yian, eastern Taiwan. At least 17 people died after the derailment
CNA/AFP/Getty
US President Donald Trump waves as he boards Marine One after a “Make America Great” rally in Mesa, Arizona on October 19, 2018. - US President Donald Trump said Friday, October 19, 2018, that he found credible Saudi Arabia’s assertion that dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi died as a result of a fight
AFP/Getty
A Palestinian youth runs past a rolling burning tire during clashes with Israeli forces following a demonstration after the weekly Friday prayers, in the centre of the occupied West Bank city of Hebron
AFP/Getty
Honduran migrants heading in a caravan to the United States, leave Guatemala City. US President Donald Trump threatened to send the military to close its southern border if Mexico fails to stem the “onslaught” of migrants from Central America, in a series of tweets that blamed Democrats ahead of the midterm elections
AFP/Getty
Smoke billows following an Israeli air strike around the southern Gaza Strip city of Rafah. Israel launched raids against targets in the Gaza strip in response to rocket fire from the Palestinian territory that caused damage in a southern city, the Israeli army said
AFP/Getty
Ecuador has issued a list of rules to Julian Assange, the famous resident of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. The list included cleaning the bathroom, not commenting on foreign political affairs online and taking better care of his cat (pictured). The document states that failure to comply with these rules “could lead to the termination of the diplomatic asylum granted by the Ecuadorian state”
Reuters
Israeli soldiers hurl tear gas grenades during clashes following Israeli order to shut down the al-Lubban/al-Sawiyeh school near the west bank city of Nablus, 15 October 2018. According to local sources, 20 Palestinians were wounded during clashes as dozens try to defiance the Israeli order to shut down the school
EPA
Serbia’s Novak Djokovic kisses the trophy after winning his men’s final singles match against Croatia’s Borna Coric at the Shanghai Masters. Djokovic, who has now won four titles this season, will move up one ranking spot to No. 2, pushing Roger Federer back to No. 3
AFP/Getty
Demonstrators raising red painted hands and a placard reading “we must change the system not the climate” referring to the need to stop climate change during a march in Bordeaux, southwestern France
AFP/Getty
Spanish Unionist demonstrators carry Spanish flags during a demonstration on Spain’s National Day in Barcelona
Reuters
Russia has halted all crewed space flights following the failed launch of the Soyuz MS-10 rocket (pictured). Investigations in to the rocket’s malfunction are ongoing
Reuters
People look on at a damaged store after Hurricane Michael passed through Panama City, Florida. A Category 4 storm, with maximum sustained winds of 155 mph, was the most powerful storm ever to hit the Florida Panhandle
Getty
The Darul Muttaqien Mosque was the heart of the community for many in Palu. A lot of the victims were inside their homes or at the mosque when the quake struck. Magareb prayer for many, was their last. Paddy Dowling travelled with UK based charity Muslim Aid to the disaster areas of North Sulawesi to witness the scale of Indonesia’s earthquake & tsunami. They are the only British NGO delivering aid out in Palu through local partners
Paddy Dowling
People take part in a candle-light vigil in memory of Bulgarian TV journalist Viktoria Marinova in Ruse
Reuters
Supporters of Jair Bolsonaro, presidential candidate with the Social Liberal Party, celebrate in front of his house during the general elections in Rio. The far-right congressman, who waxes nostalgically about the dictatorship, won the vote but not an outright victory. The second-round-run-off will be between Bolsoanro and the leftist Workers’ party Fernando Haddad
AP
Demonstrators hold a banner that reads “freedom of the press, not allowed to be trampled” and “shame on the governments vindictive move” past a symbolic ‘political red line’ during a protest after Hong Kong immigration authorities declined a visa renewal for senior Financial Times journalist Victor Mallet, outside the immigration department building in Hong Kong. Hong Kong’s decision to effectively blacklist a senior Financial Times journalist required an “urgent explanation”, the UK said
AFP/Getty
Congolese doctor Denis Mukwege and Yazidi campaigner Nadia Murad announced as the winners of the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize. The pair were awarded the honour “for their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict.”
AFP/Getty/Reuters
Dutch security services expel Russian spies over plot targeting chemical weapons watchdog. This picture shows the four GRU officers who entered the Netherlands at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on April 10, travelling on official Russian passports. On April 13 they parked a car carrying specialist hacking equipment outside the headquarters of the OPCW in The Hague. At that point the Dutch counter-terrorism officers intervened to disrupt the operation and the four GRU officers were ordered to leave the country
PA
Quake survivors make their way past a washed out passenger ferry in Wani, Indonesia’s Central Sulawesi, after an earthquake and tsunami hit the area on September 28. Nearly 1,400 people are now known to have died as UN officials warned the “needs remain vast” for both desperate survivors and rescue teams still searching for victims
AFP/Getty
US first lady Melania Trump holds a baby during a visit to a hospital in Accra, Ghana. The first lady is visiting Africa on her first big solo international trip, aiming to make child well-being the focus of a five-day, four-country tour
Reuters
Indian school children dressed like Mahatma Gandhi perform yoga during a event at a school in Chennai ahead of his birth anniversary. Indians all over the country celebrate Gandhi’s birthday on October 2
AFP/Getty
“It’s hard work. But as long as you have them engaged….I know I’m funny,” he says. The worst fear for a comedian, the one thing every one dreads, he says, is a silent audience.
For all the cultural differences between the many audiences he has performed for around the world, Amer says he believes comedians can be - or even should be - global even in their appeal.
“I’ve never had any issues with this,” he says. “My mentor in Houston said to me to be universal. At that point, it was in the US. And you had to be a funny in west Texas as you are in New York City.
“That rang true globally for me. The only thing is that in some [places] Jo-Burg was one, they don’t get the set-up.”
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Amer, who is set to begin work with comedian Ramy Youssef on a series that explores the life of a first-generation American Muslim in New Jersey, believes stand-up comedy is enjoying “a golden age”.
He likens improv comedy to jazz, or even hip hop, an art form that has only been around 25 years so. And like self-starting musicians, he says comedians are also seizing the opportunities presented to them by the surging interest in platform such as YouTube.
“YouTube has helped people become very funny,” he says. “And there are no commercials.”
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