NASCAR has decided to ban Confederate flags from their racing events, but found one racers sponsor, is a company that profits from the sale of the confederate flags and other racist items. Chris Glorioso reports.
What to Know
- After banning Confederate flags from racing events, NASCAR has not responded to questions about a recent sponsorship deal with Gunbroker.com, a website that hosts advertisements selling Confederate flags and other material commemorating white supremacist ideology.
- Gunbroker.com bills itself as an online marketplace where buyers can shop for new and used guns, ammunition, and accessories. Among the accessories the I-Team found for sale on the site were confederate flags and Ku Klux Klan patches and stickers.
- Last month, Gunbroker.com announced a sponsorship of Garrett Smithley's #51 stockcar, a vehicle featured in NASCAR's iRacing series - an online schedule of races that mirrors the NASCAR Cup Series and allows people at home to simulate their own participation in the contests.
After banning Confederate flags from racing events, NASCAR has not responded to questions about a recent sponsorship deal with Gunbroker.com, a website that hosts advertisements selling Confederate flags and other material commemorating white supremacist ideology.
Gunbroker.com bills itself as an online marketplace where buyers can shop for new and used guns, ammunition, and accessories. Among the accessories the I-Team found for sale on the site were Confederate flags and Ku Klux Klan patches and stickers.
One seller using the Gunbroker platform had 3x5 foot double-sided Confederate flags for sale. In the description, the seller wrote, "we have sold hundreds of these due to recent controversial political efforts to ban them!"
Another seller advertised a "KKK Ku Klux Klan Teardrop Cross Patch" with free shipping. In the description the seller wrote, "New condition, leftover from my gunshow days. Almost out of these."
Last month, Gunbroker.com announced a sponsorship of Garrett Smithley's #51 stockcar, a vehicle featured in NASCAR's iRacing series — an online schedule of races that mirrors the NASCAR Cup Series and allows people at home to simulate their own participation in the contests.
The sponsorship announcement also said Gunbroker.com would be offered as the primary sponsor of Smithley's car in the upcoming Brickyard 400, traditional race with real cars held in Indianapolis.
News
Attempts to reach Gunbroker.com CEO Steven Urvin were unsuccessful.
As of the publication of this article, representatives of NASCAR had yet to respond to questions about the Gunbroker sponsorship.
Wednesday, amid nationwide demonstrations condemning systemic racism and police brutality against African Americans, NASCAR announced a ban on Confederate flags at its racing events. The decision came just days after the sport's most prominent African American driver, Bubba Wallace, called for the ban. At a NASCAR event in Martinsville, Virginia, Wednesday, Wallace drove a black race car with the words "#BlackLivesMatter" painted on it.
A representative for Wallace didn't immediately respond to questions about the Gunbroker.com sponsorship of Garrett Smithley's car.
Dave Zirin, Sports Editor for The Nation, said after banning Confederate flags from its events, NASCAR will find it hard to maintain a sponsorship relationship with Gunbroker.com.
"They're going to have to disentangle themselves from sponsors like this or they're going to be called out for hypocrisy," Zirin said. "If they're called out for hypocrisy they're honestly going to lose both sides. They're going to lose the people who want them to cling to these traditions, no matter how odious, and they're going to lose the people who are trying to look at NASCAR and say 'hey wait a minute, maybe this is a forward-looking, 21st century sport.'"
Neither Garrett Smithley nor the owner of his car, Rick Ware Racing, immediately responded to requests for comment about the GunBroker.com sponsorship.
Dave Zirin, Sports Editor for The Nation, said after banning Confederate flags from its events, NASCAR will find it hard to maintain a sponsorship relationship with Gunbroker.com.
"They're going to have to disentangle themselves from sponsors like this or they're going to be called out for hypocrisy," Zirin said. "If they're called out for hypocrisy they're honestly going to lose both sides. They're going to lose the people who want them to cling to these traditions, no matter how odious, and they're going to lose the people who are trying to look at NASCAR and say 'hey wait a minute, maybe this is a forward-looking, 21st century sport.'"
Gunbroker has sponsored race cars in other NASCAR events going back to 2004 and the website is no stranger to controversy over the white supremacist relics sold on its platform.
After an I-Team investigation in 2018 found Nazi paraphernalia for sale on Gunbroker.com, several federal lawmakers called for the U.S. Olympic Shooting Team to cut its relationship with the website.
The US Olympic Committee also criticized the deal between Gunbroker.com and USA Shooting, but the Shooting Team itself resisted calls to drop Gunbroker, saying its business relationship with the website in no way condones profiting from white supremacist relics and was for the sole purpose of hosting auctions of donated firearms to benefit the team.
