Media

The New York Times Defends Mara Gay’s Comments About American Flag And White Trump Supporters

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Virginia Kruta Associate Editor
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The New York Times defended editorial board member Mara Gay Tuesday after she referred to American flags on display in Long Island as “disturbing.”

“New York Times editorial board member Mara Gay’s comments on MSNBC have been irresponsibly taken out of context. Her argument was that Trump and many of his supporters have politicized the American flag. The attacks on her today are ill-informed and grounded in bad-faith,” the NYT’s public relations department tweeted. (RELATED: Mara Gay Says It’s ‘Disturbing’ To See American Flags In America, Blames White Trump Supporters)

Gay said during a Tuesday morning appearance on “Morning Joe” that she had recently visited Long Island and had seen a number of flags attacking President Joe Biden. She also saw American flags, and said she was concerned that former President Donald Trump’s supporters were unable to parse the difference between “Americanness” and “whiteness.”

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“We have to figure out how to get every American a place at the table in this democracy … how to separate Americanness, America, from whiteness,” Gay said.

“I was really disturbed,” she added. “I saw … in some cases, just dozens of American flags, which is also just disturbing. Essentially, the message was clear, this is my country. This is not your country. I own this.”

Critics quickly fired back against the editorial board’s defense of Gay.