Controversial S#!T

Denver Nuggets forward Michael Porter Jr. believes COVID was secretly created for global "population control" ... and warns things are about to get much, much worse.

It was all part of a bizarre Snapchat Q&A session on Tuesday -- when the 2018 1st-round NBA Draft pick decided to go full conspiracy theorist when asked about the pandemic.

"Personally, I think that the coronavirus is being used obviously for a bigger agenda," 22-year-old Porter said from his room in the NBA Bubble in Orlando.

"It’s being used for population control in just terms of being able to control the masses of people."

More than 661,000 people have reportedly died from COVID around the world since the pandemic began -- with more than 16.7 MILLION cases.

Porter thinks it's all part of some diabolical plot for global control.

"Because of this virus, the whole world is being controlled. You’re required to wear masks, and who knows what’ll happen when this vaccine comes out. You might have to have the vaccine in order to travel. That’d be crazy."

And yeah, that's when Porter pivoted into some anti-vaxxer talk ...

"I've never been vaccinated in my life. I've never had any shots or anything like that. So, it could get crazy."

FYI, it seems impossible for Porter not to have been vaccinated at some point in his life since basketball players at Missouri (where he played college ball) were required to comply with the 2-dose MMR Immunization Policy -- which essentially requires proof of vaccination against measles, mumps and rubella.

Still, Porter continued his rant ...

"It's definitely an agenda behind everything that's going on right now and all you can do is sit back and watch what's going on."

"Don't get too emotionally involved," Porter warned ... "but yeah, I mean it is a serious thing -- it's a real thing but yes it's being overblown."

Barbie's new line of dolls meant to inspire all girls to raise their voices and get interested in public service quickly got political when Donald Trump Jr. got involved ... but the toy company's shutting him down.

Shortly after the Barbie 2020 Campaign Team -- made up of 4 diverse dolls including a candidate, a campaign manager, a fundraiser and a voter -- was unveiled to "expose girls to public leadership roles and pique their interest in shaping the future" ... Don Jr. used it to take a shot at Democrats.

Don tweeted ... "'Voter' Barbie must be a Democrat because she’s already wearing an 'I Voted' sticker and yet she’s got another ballot in her hand."

Not the most original joke, and according to the makers of Barbie ... it's also inaccurate.

A Mattel spokesperson tells TMZ ... "Barbie is not, and has never been, affiliated with a political party. Barbie has always encouraged girls to stand up for what they believe in and shows them they can be anything."

The Mattel rep adds ... "This doll set highlights a range of leadership roles to pique their interest in shaping the future and raise their voices – from the podium to the polls. This set also provides a tool to allow families to have conversations around important events and cultural moments through play."

Of course, Don Jr.'s joke comes as President Trump continues to push claims mail-in voting is fraudulent and will only benefit Democrats in the upcoming election.

Truth is, there are no facts to back that up ... just like Jr.'s jab at Barbie.

Georgia Senator David Perdue has pulled an ad that made his Jewish, Democratic opponent's nose look bigger -- claiming it was a flub and not an anti-Semitic trope.

The Facebook ad featured photos of both Jon Ossoff, who's running in Georgia to take Perdue's seat -- as well as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (who's also Jewish) -- with the slogan, "Democrats Are Trying to Buy Georgia!"

In other words, a Jew with an artificially big nose is trying to buy an election. But, Perdue says no anti-Semitism here.

Ossoff responded, saying ... "Sitting U.S. Senator David Perdue's digital attack ad distorted my face to enlarge and extend my nose. I'm Jewish. This is the oldest, most obvious, least original anti-Semitic trope in history. Senator, literally no one believes your excuses."

For his part, Sen. Perdue said the ad was made through a third party, and that any distortion to Ossoff's appearance was an accident. They removed the ad this week.

His campaign added, "Anybody who implies that this was anything other than an inadvertent error is intentionally misrepresenting Senator Perdue's strong and consistent record of standing firmly against anti-Semitism and all forms of hate."

Here's rapper Jack Harlow showing love for his pal, Lou Williams -- just days after accidentally exposing him in a strip club incident that rocked the NBA.

Yep, it was Harlow who posted -- and then quickly deleted -- a pic of the L.A. Clippers star at Magic City last week which landed Williams in some hot water with the league.

Remember, Williams had received permission to leave the NBA Bubble in Orlando to attend a funeral in Atlanta ... and was ordered to stay away from places with a high COVID exposure risk.

LIKE STRIP CLUBS!

Of course, Williams insists he was only at the club for 20 minutes to pick up some chicken wings -- which are apparently AMAZING -- and didn't put himself in harm's way.

The "What's Poppin" rapper TRIED to lie to cover for his friend -- initially saying the pic was a throwback -- but the truth eventually emerged.

Williams is now serving a mandatory 10-day quarantine so he can get back into the bubble.

In the meantime, Harlow is now in L.A. where he was spotted in Lou's Clippers jersey.

Tiffany Haddish is opening up about the idea of motherhood, but says one thing above all else scares her -- bringing a child into a racist world.

The actress and comedian discussed the topic on NBA star Carmelo Anthony's hit podcast, "What's in Your Glass?," saying everyone's always asking her when she's going to have some babies.

Her answer ... "There's a part of me that would like to do that, and I always make up these excuses like, 'Oh, I need a million dollars in the bank before I do that, I need this, I need that.' But really, it's like, I would hate to give birth to someone that looks like me, knowing that they're gonna be hunted or killed."

Tiffany teared up as she added ... "Why would I put someone through that?"

Carmelo -- who has a teenage son -- said, "It's scary to even think about that" ... and Haddish pointed out that white people don't have that concern.

Rep. Maxine Waters fears what's going on in Portland could be a sign of trouble to come in November ... IF President Trump loses the election, and refuses to give up power.

The Congresswoman, who was on Capitol Hill, was super concerned over AG William Barr's testimony, in which he supported the aggressive federal response to the protests.

Even more ominous than Barr ... Trump refusing to say he'd accept the results of the election, win or lose, and even more ominous ... whether he'd hand over the reigns of power.

Rep. Waters makes it clear ... she's worried her fears could become a reality, especially since neither Trump nor Barr will squarely say the President will accept the election results.

Waters says there's evidence Trump won't go willingly if he loses ... as she puts it, he's a wanna-be dictator whose methods follow a long line of dictators. And, she thinks the federal presence in Portland may be a dry run for things to come in November.

The L.A. County Sheriff's Department's investigation has determined a cop's Starbucks drink was NOT tampered with a tampon -- instead it was a cleaning cloth ... which still ain't great.

You remember an off-duty LAPD cop made the accusation last month ... saying a Starbucks employee stuffed down a tampon in the Frapp drink he ordered. The cop claimed he used his police credit union debit card to buy the drink and says he found the feminine hygiene product inside his drink. This all went down at the height of social unrest over police brutality.

In any event ... the Sheriff's Dept. investigated and was unable to prove the store employee acted maliciously. Sheriff Alex Villanueva said, "Based on the evidence available at this time, the item in the drink was possibly a cleaning type cloth commonly used by store employees."

The camera used to videotape LAPD officers beating Rodney King is about to go up for sale to the public, but this piece of history is gonna cost ya 6 figures.

Auction house Nate D. Sanders will put the original Sony camera up on the auction block this Thursday, and the opening bid is set at $225k -- which means they expect it to fetch wayyy more than that.

George Holliday used the camera on March 3, 1991 -- when he shot the horrific scene from his apartment balcony in L.A. What he captured eventually set off the 1992 L.A. riots ... after the 4 white cops involved were acquitted in the criminal trial.

Holliday referenced the significance of his camera and how it's more relevant today than ever, saying ... "I hope this video camera inspires people to use their power to record events that they find troubling." He added, "Don’t be afraid to use it."

It's unclear if the original videotape of the Rodney beating is included in the auction piece -- but Holliday has said that people to this day still seek him out to obtain and use it. It was most recently featured in a Netflix documentary about the riots.

Although King wasn't victorious in criminal court, he won on the civil lawsuit in 1994 -- with a jury finding the city of Los Angeles liable for his injuries, and awarding him nearly $4 million.

He died in a 2012 accidental drowning.

Two white guys in Las Vegas told a black woman her baby girl needed to pipe down 'cause she was annoying them -- and she recorded the whole disgusting encounter.

This went down at a Japanese joint Monday, where the mother started filming the two men -- we'll call them Kens (Karen gets a day off) -- from across the restaurant. She feels one of the guys was being racist because he'd said something about her 1-year-old daughter making noises -- ya know, like babies tend to do.

The men never say anything racist on camera, but the mom claims they said something before the video started. When the men realize she's recording, they whip out their own phones, and the older guy got out of his chair and accosted the mom and the 2 kids at her table.

50 Cent's doing what he hardly ever does after one of his troll jobs -- he's saying sorry ... and it's none other than to Megan Thee Stallion, who made it clear his jokes were hurtful.

Fitty hopped on the Gram Monday to issue a mea culpa following Meg's tearful video, writing ... "👀Damn I didn’t think this shit was real,🤦‍♂️It sounded so crazy @theestallion i’m glad your feeling better and i hope you can accept my apology. I posted a meme that was floating around. I wouldn’t have done that if i knew you was really hurt sorry. 🤷🏽‍♂️"

The apology comes on the heels of Megan herself going into more detail about the gun incident, which left her with bullets in both her feet and required surgery.

During her IG Live sesh, Meg was fighting back tears as she tried speaking about it ... explaining it was a serious situation, and she didn't appreciate all the jokes and mocking from scores of people on social media in the immediate aftermath.

That includes 50, who put up two different memes making fun of the scenario. One of them portrayed Meg running away from a car as Tory Lanez chased her in a car -- a screengrab from a scene in 'Boyz n the Hood' with Meg and Tory's faces Photoshopped in -- and another showed Tory as MiniMe from 'Austin Powers' holding a gun. Both have been deleted.

MLB launched a probe into a video that allegedly shows Yankees staffers illegally recording another team during the 2018 season ... but we're told the Yankees were ultimately cleared of wrongdoing.

The video has been quietly making the rounds for about a month -- and this week, began to surface on social media.

The footage appears to show a person with a high-end camera recording an opposing team's catcher.

We were told there are multiple players who strongly believe the footage is smoking gun proof of the Yankees stealing signs from the Boston Red Sox during a 2018 ALCS playoff game.

But, our MLB sources are adamant that's just not the case -- telling TMZ Sports the league investigated the footage and found a couple things.

First, we're told the video is NOT from the 2018 ALCS. MLB believes it was shot during a regular-season game in May 2018 -- and the opposing team was NOT the Red Sox,.

Second, a league source tells us the MLB probe ultimately "found nothing in violation of our rules."

Senator Tom Cotton has just out-Trumped Trump, calling slavery "a necessary evil" that allowed America to develop, and he wants to retaliate against schools that teach the real history of slavery.

The Republican Senator from Arkansas put it this way ... “As the Founding Fathers said, it was the necessary evil upon which the union was built, but the union was built in a way, as Lincoln said, to put slavery on the course to its ultimate extinction."

So, in essence, what he's saying is that slavery was needed because it served a purpose but the plan was to eventually end it.

It gets even more outrageous. Cotton wants to withhold federal funds from public schools that promote an initiative by the New York Times called the 1619 Project. It was established in 2019 to mark the 400th anniversary of enslaved Africans coming to America. The point of the project is to tell the real story of slavery and the contributions of African Americans ... something public schools don't do at all.

Cotton says he rejects the notion systemic racism in America is engrained in America from the beginning to the present ... something that otherwise seems firmly established.

A Vietnam veteran took a nozzle-full of pepper spray right to the face as he confronted federal officers in riot gear who've now taken to the streets of Portland.

The incident was captured Saturday night by journalist Andrew Kimmel, and it shows Mike Hastie peacefully confronting the authorities -- some of whom are said to be Homeland Security Border Patrol agents recently deployed by the White House.

Mike is telling them about his service in 'Nam, where he says he was a medic ... and where Americans committed atrocities against the Vietnamese people, something he says the agents and their generation know nothing about. He was keeping his distance and being peaceful -- simply voicing his opinion to the squad in front of him. Not being threatening at all.

And yet, that didn't stop one of the agents from pepper spraying him right in his face, point-blank and walking off like nothing happened. It went down almost like a hit of sorts.

Mike retreated -- clearly injured by the spray, which was all over his face and eyes -- but he kept up his rant, continuing to get his message across as the officers shipped out. We gotta say for someone who just got a dose of that in their eyeballs, the dude stood tough.

This is just a small example of the chaos that has overtaken the streets of Portland over the past week or so -- where cops and feds alike are deploying tear gas and pepper spray to break up the civil unrest that's been unfolding. In most cases, like this, the method is completely unnecessary and a blatant use of excessive force ... which can be heinous.

Mike Ditka says anthem kneeling protests are unpatriotic ... and the NFL legend tells TMZ Sports if he had it his way, he wouldn't allow the demonstrations in his new women's football league.

The Hall of Famer is slated to be the chairman of the X League -- a women's tackle football org. that was previously known as the Legends Football League -- and when we asked him if he'd be OK with protests during the national anthem, he straight-up said no.

"If you can't respect our national anthem, get the hell out of the country," Ditka said. "That's the way I feel. Of course, I'm old fashioned, so I'm only going to say what I feel."

Colin Kaepernick and others have said the kneeling protests have nothing to do with military or the flag ... they've continuously claimed the demonstrations are all about raising awareness for social justice and police brutality in America.

Some high-profile people like Drew Brees have changed their stance on the anthem in light of recent events -- including the death of George Floyd.

But, Ditka says he's sticking to his guns -- claiming he views kneeling as a slap in the face to the red, white and blue.

"You don't protest against the flag and you don't protest against this country who's given you the opportunities to make a living playing a sport that you never thought would happen," Ditka says. "So, I don't want to hear all the crap."

Ditka says he does NOT have the final say when it comes to the league's national anthem policy -- these are just his personal feelings.

As for the league itself, Ditka believes it has HUGE potential -- featuring a bunch of truly talented female athletes "knocking the crap out of each other."

Ditka's new league, which will feature 8 teams in major markets like L.A., Chicago and Seattle, is slated to kick off in April 2021.

"These women are pretty and good looking and want to knock the crap out of each other -- we'll see how it works!"

President Trump's latest guest on the golf course is someone many people probably didn't expect to see ... one Brett Favre, who recently voiced admiration for Colin Kaepernick.

The former QB and 45 hit the links Saturday, and even posed for a photo together that the White House later threw up online. They're both in golfing attire, and seem pretty chummy standing next to one another, with DT flashing the thumbs up and Brett with his arm on the Prez's back.

Up until now, we hadn't heard much from BF on his political leanings, especially as it pertains to Trump. Not that golfing with the guy indicates anything either, other than the fact that they're friendly. Still, though it's interesting -- especially when you bring Kap into the equation.

Remember, Brett told TMZ Sports that he considered Kaepernick in the same vein as Pat Tillman -- the former NFL player who enlisted in the armed services back in the 2000s, and then later died while at war ... a hero, in other words. Brett seemed to compare Kap to Pat.

He later clarified his comments, saying they weren't completely alike -- obviously, Pat made the ultimate sacrifice with his life -- but he noted they both sidelined their football careers for a cause bigger than themselves. Still, the sentiment was more or less the same.

With that in mind, you gotta wonder if CK was brought up during this outing. Of course, Trump has vocally criticized Kaepernick in the past, as well as any other players who take a knee during the National Anthem -- but he hasn't been so down on the guy these days.