Vice President Mike Pence reportedly did not stand, when the combined Korean Team made their way into the opening ceremonies of the 2018 Winter Olympics.
So of course, ESPN’s Jemele Hill had something to say about it on Twitter.
Upon hearing that Pence and his wife had chosen not to stand for the unified team, Hill tweeted this:
The irony, obviously, being that Pence walked out of a 49ers-Colts game during the 2017 regular season when large numbers of 49ers knelt in protest of the national anthem.
According to the Associated Press, “The White House official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said Pence stood only for the U.S. team, despite other people in the box standing and applauding when athletes from the two Koreas walked in together. The games are taking place amid an international standoff over North Korea’s nuclear weapons.”
Here was the scene in the VIP box, as the unified team made their way into the stadium:
Hill’s tweet was met with the scorn it so richly deserved:
Jemele Hill recently began writing for ESPN’s The Undefeated full-time. She “left” her SportsCenter show in January, after a litany of highly-publicized, political tweets landed her in hot water. Most notably, last September, Hill called President Trump a “white supremacist.” Shortly after that, Hill was finally suspended after advising Twitter followers on how to execute a corporate boycott of the Dallas Cowboys.
Hill’s tweet about Pence probably won’t arise to the level of disciplinary action, given that it arose from a sports-related event. However, equating the protest of your country’s flag and those who defend it with the protest of a country that is actively trying to incinerate you, probably means you should quit Twitter.