Former Atlanta Braves great Chipper Jones did not mean any harm when he asked on Twitter last weekend whether illegal immigrants would stop crossing the Rio Grande if it was full of gators. But he apologized the next day anyway after there was some public outrage.
He ended his tweet by writing, “Jk,” which means “just kidding.” There was outrage, and people started calling him a racist, which prompted Jones to issue an apology on Sunday.
“I realize that my tweet yest was offensive and distasteful,” Jones wrote. “An attempt at humor was a terrible mistake. Please accept my heartfelt apology!”
As a writer for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution noted, Herman Cain, a former Republican presidential candidate, also proposed “an alligator-filled moat” to deter illegal immigrants. The publication’s “The Hater” blog wrote, “Don’t see what the big deal is here. Everybody knows if you append a statement with ‘JK’ then it totally negates whatever negative connotation might be drawn from the preceding statement.”
Y’all think if they took all them gators they trap in Fla and La and put them in the Rio Grande, it wud stop the illegals from crossing? Jk
— Chipper Jones (@RealCJ10) June 8, 2013
I realize that my tweet yest was offensive and distasteful. An attempt at humor was a terrible mistake. Please accept my heartfelt apology!
— Chipper Jones (@RealCJ10) June 9, 2013
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