Going Viral: Dave Portnoy’s Complete Meltdown and Shocking Attack on His Employee During Live Segment Is Making Headlines …Update: Portnoy Responds

Dave Portnoy, the founder of Barstool Sports, suffered an embarrassing meltdown on Wednesday during a live segment with two of his employees during their discussion of “Jewish jokes.”

Portnoy completely berated his employee Kirk Minihane who argued that free speech means putting up with disgusting Jew-hating jokes in a society. Portnoy exploded when he heard this and screamed at Minihane, “Shut the f*ck up, you bald f*ck!”

Portnoy followed this up with, “Shut up!… You work for me!”

Minihane responded, “Sure, for now…”

That pushed Portnoy to scream, “For now? Quit! I’ll save $500,000!”

Minihane: “Is this a show or not a show? We can’t have a conversation?” Portnoy: “You’re an idiot. You’re literally saying people should be allowed to make Jew jokes whenever they want.”

This was a very ugly display by Dave Portnoy.

JUST IN: Dave Portnoy has a meltdown, tells Barstool’s Kirk Minihane to “shut the f*ck up you bald f*ck” after Minihane criticized Portnoy’s approach to “Jew jokes”

Portnoy: “Shut up!… You work for me!”

Minihane: “Sure. You bet. For now…”

Portnoy: “For now? Quit! I’ll save… pic.twitter.com/AM5Y2InCll

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) June 4, 2025

Jason Whitlock chimed in after watching Portnoy’s display: “This video is disturbing. The lack of emotional control, the condescension and supremacist mindset, the anger. WOW. There’s a darkness within Portnoy that’s frightening. This is indefensible.”

This video is disturbing. The lack of emotional control, the condescension and supremacist mindset, the anger. WOW. There’s a darkness within Portnoy that’s frightening. This is indefensible. pic.twitter.com/f8K8z017QY

— Jason Whitlock (@WhitlockJason) June 5, 2025

During the segment, Portnoy is arguing for speech laws. Robby Starbuck argues that Dave’s speech laws will not work in America today.

Robby Starbuck: We can’t ever have that. I’m understanding of what @stoolpresidente ’s concerned about but we must never enact speech laws in America beyond the current law that criminalizes incitement to violence and makes defamation illegal.

If you aren’t inciting violence by calling for violence or inventing something defamatory then it’s freedom of speech. That does not mean you’re free from consequences though and Dave is free to dole out consequences for speech he disagrees with. That’s how it works in America. People call me all kinds of names, I pay it no attention unless they say something defamatory or they break the law with calls for violence.

Dave asks “When does freedom of speech start to impinge on freedom of religion?” and he won’t like this answer but it never does beyond calls for violence. What he seems to be asking for amounts to the kind of blasphemy laws that Islam calls for.

We can’t ever have that. I’m…

— Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) June 4, 2025

UPDATE: Dave Portnoy posted a response to the video on Thursday morning.

Dave asks “When does freedom of speech start to impinge on freedom of religion?” and he won’t like this answer but it never does beyond calls for violence. What he seems to be asking for amounts to the kind of blasphemy laws that Islam calls for.

We can’t ever have that. I’m…

— Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) June 4, 2025