NASCAR Releases Image of Noose Found in Bubba Wallace’s Garage

In a statement posted on Twitter on Wednesday, Wallace said he was relieved “that the investigation revealed that this wasn’t what we feared it was.”

“I think we’ll gladly take a little embarrassment over what the alternatives could have been,” he added.

The discovery of the noose came amid national protests over police brutality and systemic racism following the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis last month, and NASCAR’s recent ban of the Confederate battle flag from its events and properties. Wallace, who called for the ban, had also unveiled a “Black Lives Matter” message on his racecar this month.

On Thursday, Phelps defended his initial response.

“Should we have toned that message down slightly? Maybe we should have,” he said. “And I’ll take responsibility for that. I stand by the actions that we took and I think they were the right ones.”

As part of NASCAR’s investigation, 1,684 garage areas across 29 racetracks were inspected, he said. Only 11 pull-down ropes tied into a knot were found and only one of those — the one found in Wallace’s garage — was tied in a noose, he said.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/26/sports/autoracing/nascar-noose-bubba-wallace.html