New York Times editor deletes and apologizes for past ‘offensive’ tweets
A senior editor at the New York Times apologized Thursday for “offensive” tweets from nearly a decade ago, as one Republican lawmaker called for his firing.
“I have deleted tweets from a decade ago that are offensive. I am deeply sorry,” New York politics desk editor Tom Wright-Piersanti said on Twitter after Breitbart News drew attention to the tweets.
I have deleted tweets from a decade ago that are offensive. I am deeply sorry.
— Tom Wright-Piersanti (@tomwp) August 22, 2019
The tweets, which were deleted late Wednesday, include one from Jan. 1, 2010, in which Wright-Piersanti referred to a “Crappy Jew Year.”
“I was going to say ‘Crappy Jew Year,’ but one of my resolutions is to be less anti-Semitic. So… HAPPY Jew Year. You Jews,” he wrote in one tweet.
{mosads}Another, from December 2009, referred to the “Jew-police.”
“We are aware of these tweets, which are a clear violation of our standards. We are reviewing next steps,” The New York Times said in a statement.
Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-N.Y.), who is Jewish, has called on Wright-Piersanti to be fired.
“An editor from the New York Times is scrubbing his [Twitter] account, this guy Tom Wright-Piersanti, because he was self-describing himself as an anti-Semite and he was going after Jews and others,” Zeldin said on Fox News Thursday morning before saying he “should be fired.”
Wright-Piersanti also deleted other offensive tweets.
“There are four indian guys with mohawks in this one class, and each one is a douche in his own awful way. I hate mohawk Indians,” reads one tweet dated Dec. 8, 2009.
“I don’t hate Mohawk Indians, though. I love those guys. I just hate Indians with mohawks. Different indians, different mohawks,” he wrote in another tweet that same day.
The Hill has reached out to Wright-Piersanti for comment.
Earlier this month the Times demoted its deputy Washington editor, Jonathan Weisman, over a pair of controversial tweets, removing him as a congressional editor and saying he will no longer be active on social media.
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