Well well well. It turns out that the Georgia Democrat we reported on over the weekend, who accused a man of going on a racist rant inside a grocery store on Friday, is now walking back a big part of her claim.
State Rep. Erica Thomas, who also blamed Trump for inciting hatred, said the man had told her to “go back where you came from”. The man, Eric Sparkes, denied saying that phrase or any racial insult at the lady. Though he did admit to being a jerk.
FOX NEWS – A Georgia state lawmaker has walked back a significant part of her viral claim that a white man told her to “go back where you came from” during a testy argument in a supermarket checkout lane, after the man denied the encounter unfolded the way she described.
Multiple news organizations on Sunday portrayed the episode as a plausible instance of racism, though the lawmaker already had tried to clarify her accusations.
State Rep. Erica Thomas herself acknowledged in an interview with local media on Saturday that she did not recall exactly what the man, Eric Sparkes, had said to her.
“He said, ‘go back,’ you know, those types of words,” Thomas said on Saturday. “I don’t wanna say he said ‘go back to your country,’ or ‘go back to where you came from,’ but he was making those types of references, is what I remember.”
“So, you don’t remember exactly what he said?” a reporter pressed.
Thomas answered: “No, no, definitely not. But I know it was ‘go back,’ because I know I told him to ‘go back.'”
That admission contradicted the tearful video Thomas posted to Facebook this past Friday, in which she said she was with her young daughter in the market and had more than 10 items in the supermarket’s express lane.
So now, after her video goes viral and she gets all this media attention, she admits that she doesn’t remember exactly what the man said? Wow.
If I had to guess I’d say she intentionally took what the man said out of context and never expected he’d show up at the grocery store to defend himself to news reporters. If he did say ‘go back’, it was probably in reference to another checkout line that was supposed to handle more than 12 items.
Sparkes, who says he’s also a Democrat, was admittedly a jerk to Thomas and hopefully he’s learned a life lesson after this fiasco.
But for Thomas to construe what he said into racism, all for the point of her own political gain by tapping into the Trump hatred on the left, is reprehensible and ranks up there with the Smollets of the world.