DAVIS COUNTY
Amid backlash and accusations of racism, Davis County man apologizes for comment about Black city council member
Apr 19, 2023, 1:00 PM | Updated: Apr 21, 2023, 12:06 pm
City Council Member Karece Thompson is pictured. (Karece Thompson official Facebook page)
(Karece Thompson official Facebook page)
SALT LAKE CITY — A local conservative group is taking heat after a commenter was accused of making a racist statement about City Council Member Karece Thompson.
The post made in the Davis County Conservatives private group was celebrating a recent event held at Weber State with conservative civil rights activist Robert Woodson and five Black panelists.
According to screenshots sent to KSL NewsRadio, and screenshots shared by Thompson on Twitter, Gary Moore commented on that post.
Today I run for the State Central Committee & I officially make this statement:
Until the leaders of the Davis County Conservatives publicly apologize to the UTGOP for racism my family absorbed which the overwhelming majority of DCRP’ers & Utah GOP’ers reject such words. pic.twitter.com/F4KLpeMGaF
— Karece ‘DCRP Member’ Thompson (@GOPKT801) April 15, 2023
KSL NewsRadio has not heard back from Thompson for comment. He told the Standard-Examiner he didn’t get a personal apology after the comment was left visible to the Davis County Conservative group for days.
The original poster, Jamie Wadman, said she sent a screenshot of the post to Thompson, stating that she and two members of the group were denouncing Moore’s comments and “more support would be coming.” She said other group members denounced it too.
The post was up for at least two days before an admin of the Davis County Conservatives page removed the comment and issued a public apology. Thompson feels it was targeted not only at him, but other people of color.
Moore’s apology
In an interview with KSL NewsRadio, Moore apologized for his comment and said he’s left a voicemail for Thompson as well.
“It was very, very, very poorly thought out on my part and I wish I had never said it,” he said. “What I said was wrong and I wish to apologize to Karece Thompson.”
Along with that, Moore apologized to the Davis County Conservatives for “dragging them into something they shouldn’t be dragged into.”
When asked to explain what he meant by his post, Moore said he was hesitant to do so for fear it could be perceived he was trying to justify what he said.
“It was a horrible mistake to express my disagreements with Karece as an elected official and my beliefs about the Republican party reaching out to core constituencies of the Democratic party in the same post…again poorly thought out and I deeply regret it.”
State senator speaks out
Utah Sen. Todd Weiler spoke out against what happened, claiming it took days to get an apology from the group and, before the apology was changed, the group only apologized for not seeing the post sooner.
“It didn’t even name Karece. It didn’t name the person who had posted the racist comment and it didn’t apologize to Karece. Then later that post was edited to name Karece. So I think it was too little too late,” said Weiler.
Thompson also made this Twitter post after the initial apology.
This is why I said. Say my name
Imagine you apologize not to the black man who absorbed the racism but apologizing for the comment not being seen sooner. The DCC don’t even mention my name. I’m a DCRP member.
😂😂😂🫣🫣🤣🤣😩 pic.twitter.com/49s2U05GAC— Karece ‘DCRP Member’ Thompson (@GOPKT801) April 17, 2023
Wadman said as soon as page admins were aware they took the post down and acknowledged that the initial apology did not name Thompson.
