Singer Aaron Lewis Cuts Show Short, Says He Doesn’t Speak Spanish: ‘I’m an American’

Recording Artist Aaron Lewis performs onstage at the HGTV Lodge during CMA Music Fest in Nashville, Tennessee, on June 11, 2016. Jason Davis/Getty Images for HGTV

During a concert, Staind singer Aaron Lewis cut his concert short and walked off the stage after saying he doesn’t speak Spanish.

Lewis, 46, got visibly irritated during a show in Pharr, Texas. The concertgoers wouldn’t stop talking and were jeering him.

“I’m only going to wait for so long and then I’m just going to say goodnight,” Lewis told the crowd, according to a video posted by TMZ.

“I don’t understand what you’re not getting,” he told the audience, who were yelling and shouting.

He added: “I know I have a microphone so you can hear me. You’re not going to hear the song unless it’s this quiet. Do you get it?”

Then one person in the crowd asked him to sing a song in Spanish, and he replied, “I’m sorry, I don’t know how to speak Spanish. I’m American.”

His comment was met with both cheers and boos.

The crowd then kept yelling for about two minutes before Lewis calmly arose from his chair, placed down his guitar, and told the audience: “Thank you very much. Have a great night.”

Lewis, whose style has been described as “outlaw country,” has not publicly commented on the matter since TMZ published the video.

After the show, Lewis posted a photo of himself on Instagram standing next to a U.S. Border Patrol agent.

“Thanks for keeping us safe, guys,” he wrote.

Staind, formed in 1995 in Massachusetts, had a number of chart-topping hits in the late 1990s and early 2000s, including “It’s Been Awhile,” “Just Go,” “Fade,” “Price to Play,” “So Far Away,” and “Right Here.”

Border Wall Update

The U.S. government is now slated to begin construction of border walls and fencing in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, which will likely be on federally owned land.

A construction crew installs new sections of the U.S.-Mexico border barrier replacing smaller fences on Jan. 11, 2019 as seen from Tijuana, Mexico. Mario Tama/Getty Images

Heavy construction equipment is expected to arrive starting Feb. 4, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection told The Associated Press.

Congress last March approved over $600 million for 33 miles of new barriers in the Rio Grande Valley.

In the meantime, the Pentagon is sending 3,750 extra U.S. forces to the border to support Border Patrol agents, the Department of Defense announced.

President Donald Trump told CBS on Sunday that he is considering declaring a national emergency over border security.

“It’s national emergency, it’s other things and you know there have been plenty of national emergencies called. And this really is an invasion of our country by human traffickers,” Trump said.

“We’re going to have a strong border. And the only way you have a strong border is you need a physical barrier. You need a wall. And anybody that says you don’t, they’re just playing games,” he added.