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LeBron James drew backlash on Wednesday over a tweet — which he later deleted and explained was born of anger — about the police shooting of 16-year-old Ma’Khia Bryant in Columbus, Ohio.
The Los Angeles Lakers star posted a photograph of Nicholas Reardon, the white Ohio police officer identified as having fatally shot the Black teen while responding to reports of an attempted stabbing.
“YOU’RE NEXT,” James wrote, alongside an emoji of an hourglass.
He also captioned the tweet with the hashtag, #ACCOUNTABILITY ― echoing his single-word tweet responding to Tuesday’s conviction of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd.
Critics accused the NBA great of inciting violence with the post and suggested he read up on the incident. Police say Bryant was appearing to threaten two other girls with a knife before being shot. Body camera footage appears to show Bryant lunging at one person and swiping at another. That characterization of events has been called into question by the teen’s family, however.
James later deleted the tweet, offering this explanation:
ANGER does any of us any good and that includes myself! Gathering all the facts and educating does though! My anger still is here for what happened that lil girl. My sympathy for her family and may justice prevail! 🙏🏾✊🏾🤎👑
— LeBron James (@KingJames) April 21, 2021
I’m so damn tired of seeing Black people killed by police. I took the tweet down because its being used to create more hate -This isn’t about one officer. it’s about the entire system and they always use our words to create more racism. I am so desperate for more ACCOUNTABILITY
— LeBron James (@KingJames) April 21, 2021
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