Senator Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) slammed The New York Times during his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday.
Amid the nationwide protests and riots following the death of George Floyd, an African American man killed during his arrest by Minneapolis police, Cotton published an op-ed in the Times calling to send federal troops into cities to restore order. Several Times staffers tweeted that the op-ed “puts Black @NYTimes staff in danger” following publication, and the internal revolt at the paper led to the resignation of the opinion page editor.
So I wrote an op-ed in the @nytimes…#CPAC2021 pic.twitter.com/1D4CqOcUez
— Tom Cotton (@TomCottonAR) February 26, 2021
The article caused a “total meltdown with the little social justice warriors at The New York Times, all these children that have been marinated in the language of the campus seminar room,” Cotton told the audience at CPAC.
“They said things like, ‘your words put my life at risk,'” Cotton continued, “As if typing on their phone, sitting on their futons, was as dangerous as being a cop trying to stop rioters in the streets. Or, ‘your words are violence.’ No, I’m sorry kiddo: words are words; violence is what your friends are doing out on the streets of America.”
The summer riots that occurred in cities across the country including New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, could cost over $1 billion in damage, according to a September 2020 estimate reported by Axios. Business owners in Kenosha, Wisc., struggled with inadequate insurance after rioters destroyed their property in late August.