Despite a Department of Defense official telling OutKick that the purging of a feature about Jackie Robinson’s military service was done accidentally, Stephen A. Smith does not think “it was an honest mistake at all.”
While the story had been removed, the new URL, which had also included the letters “DEI” in it, directed readers to a 404 page – the story, and its original link, were restored on Wednesday afternoon.
Smith took to ESPN’s “First Take,” where he called out the Trump administration for “not being honest about” “a few things,” adding there has been “a concerted effort” to “scrub history.”
“It’s not so much that you want to eradicate DEI programs…how dare you try to ignore the reason for its existence in the first place? Similar to civil rights legislation in 1964, similar to things like affirmative action, similar to things like the Rooney Rule in the National Football League, etcetera, how dare you try to get away with highlighting why it needed to exist in the first place?” Smith said. “It was because of the iniquities of folks in the United States of America – primarily the White power structure that exists. It is a fact. It is known throughout history that it is a fact. They want to gloss over and erase the need for those things to take place to begin with.”
ROBERT GRIFFIN III APPEARS TO TAKE JAB AT ESPN COLLEAGUES AFTER THEIR JACKIE ROBINSON MONOLOGUES
Smith said “nobody is calling out” Trump, but “I will.” He did so by offering to debate him, Vice President J.D. Vance, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.
“President Trump, I’m happy to sit down with you to have that conversation, sir. I’d love for you to try to defend it. Vice President Vance, you too. Pete Hegseth, you too. Stephen A. Smith is calling you out on national television. I’d love for you to sit down with the cameras rolling and try to defend this. It’s ridiculous.”
The story, titled “Sports Heroes Who Served: Baseball Great Jackie Robinson Was WWII Soldier,” was launched on Feb. 9, 2021, written by David Vergun. Other features on “Sports Heroes Who Served” include Bob Feller, Hoyt Wilhelm, Bob Uecker and many others.
Last month, the Pentagon called for a “digital content refresh” that would “remove and archive DOD news articles, photos, and videos promoting Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI).”
Robinson was drafted into the military five years before breaking Major League Baseball’s color barrier in 1947 and was honorably discharged in 1944 after serving as a second lieutenant during World War II. His number 42 was retired throughout baseball in 1997.
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