RNC night 2: Jon Ponder pardon, Abby Johnson abortion conversion, Melania calls for unity
Pro-life teen details the left's attempt to 'cancel' him
In early 2019, Nick Sandmann, then a student at Covington Catholic High School in Kentucky, traveled to the March for Life in Washington, D.C. and was part of a widely reported confrontation with Native American activists while he wore a “Make American Great Again” hat.
Sandmann, who has become a darling to conservatives as he has settled defamation lawsuits with mainstream media outlets after misleading reporting riled anger against him and his high school, appeared at the RNC to warn about the dangers of cancel culture.
During his speech, Sandmann praised Trump as “one of the most pro-life presidents in the history of our country.” He proceeded to detail what happened to him on January 18, 2019.
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“Being from Kentucky, the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln, my classmates and I visited the Lincoln Memorial,” he said. “I found myself face-to-face with Nathan Phillips and other professional protesters looking to turn me into the latest poster child showing why Trump is bad.”
“While the media portrayed me as an aggressor with a relentless smirk on my face, in reality, the video confirms I was standing with my hands behind my back in an awkward smile on my face,” Sandmann proclaimed.
He recalled the thoughts that were going through his head at the time, specifically “don’t do anything that might further agitate the man banging a drum in my face” and a desire to “never do anything to embarrass your family, yourself or your community.”
“Before I knew what was happening, it was over,” Sandmann remarked. “One of Mr. Phillips’ fellow agitators yelled out, ‘We got him. It’s all right here on video and we won, grandpa.’”
“My life changed forever in that one moment,” he said. “The full war machine of the mainstream media revved up into attack mode. They did so without researching the full video of the incident, without ever investigating Mr. Phillips’s motives, or without ever asking me for my side of the story.”
Sandmann stated that to the mainstream media, “truth was not important.”
“Advancing their anti-Christian, anti-conservative, anti-Donald Trump narrative was all that mattered,” he stated.
From their point of view, Sandmann argued that if “advancing their narrative ruined the reputation of a teenager from Covington, Kentucky, well so be it.”
“That would teach him not to wear a MAGA hat,” Sandmann suggested.
“I learned what was happening to me had a name,” he added. “It was called being canceled, as in annulled, as in revoked, as in made void.”
He said that people around the country who “refuse to be silenced by the far-left” are being “canceled.”
“Many are being fired, humiliated, or even threatened,” Sandmann explained. “And often, the media is a willing participant.”
Sandmann said he “fought back hard to expose the media for what they did to me and I won a personal victory.”
“I look forward to the day that the media returns to providing balanced, responsible, and accountable news coverage,” Sandmann said. “I know President Trump hopes for that too. And I know you’ll agree with me when we say that no one in this country has been a victim of unfair media coverage more than President Donald Trump.”
