Jussie Smollett, whose ham-handed hate crime hoax led to the cancellation of Empire, thinks we're all morons.

The unemployed actor who paid his drug dealing Nigerian friends to buy MAGA hats, bleach and a rope before staging a 2am attack in "MAGA country" - also known as downtown Chicago, has demanded that the city of Chicago, the Nigerian brothers, and former police superintendent Eddie Johnson pay him for conspiring to frame him for concocting the hate crime, according to the Cook County Record.

Smollett's case case was mysteriously quashed after Michelle Obama's former Chief of Staff, Tina Tchen, leaned on Cook County top prosecutor Kim Foxx after a grand jury slapped Smollett with a 16 count indictment for lying to the police.

According to a counterclaim to a lawsuit brought by the city of Chicago, however, Smollett is the victim of a conspiracy.

On Nov. 19, Smollett, through his lawyer, William J. Quinlan, of the Quinlan Law Firm, filed a counterclaim in Chicago federal court against the city, former police superintendent Eddie Johnson, the Nigerian brothers alleged to have helped Smollett and others. The counterclaim came as the centerpiece of Smollett’s formal answers to the lawsuit brought earlier this year by the city of Chicago, which demands Smollett be forced to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to compensate the city and taxpayers for the costs of the large police investigation into Smollett’s attack claims. In the counterclaim, Smollett asserts the hoax allegations emerged as a result of a 48-hour “interrogation” conducted by Chicago Police of brothers Abimbola “Abel” and Olabinjo “Ola” Osundairo, and was then seized on by Chicago Police to advance the story Smollett had orchestrated the attack to gain publicity and public sympathy after he allegedly became unhappy with the lack of response from television executives and others to a threatening racist and homophobic letter he claims to have received weeks earlier. -Cook County Record

Smollett claims that Chicago PD deliberately ignored exonerating evidence from the alleged attack in the very liberal, very upscale Streeterville neighborhood. According to Smollett, his attackers shouted "This is MAGA country," before physically assaulting him while he was innocently walking home at 2am from getting a Subway sandwich.

After evidence suggested it was staged, the two "attackers" - the Osundario brothers - admitted that Smollett paid them $3,500 to carry out the hoax, and that the three of them had practiced beforehand.

They also said that Smollett was involved in creating a racist letter containing a white substance that was sent to the actor on the Chicago set of Empire. When the letter failed to achieve the desired level of national outrage, the Osundario brothers say Smollett concocted the hate-crime.

Or - bear with Jussie - the Osundarios and Chicago PD conspired to frame him for the hate crime hoax.

(h/t Condor_0000)