Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s campaign team attacked a 17-year-old boy on Twitter over the weekend after the teen shared a report suggesting that an educational program about slavery at the Republican governor’s mansion could be eliminated.
The “Team Youngkin” Twitter account fired back at high school senior Ethan Lynne on Saturday by posting a photo of the teen standing with former Gov. Ralph Northam (D). It included a racist photo of Northam from his 1984 yearbook, which first made news in 2019.
“Here’s a picture of Ethan with a man that had a Blackface/KKK photo in his yearbook,” read the since-deleted Tweet that was preserved by public radio station VPM.
The bizarre photo response was an apparent comeback to Ethan ― who identifies in his Twitter profile as a political intern and high school senior ― sharing news of the resignation of the mansion’s historian and archeologist, Kelley Fanto Deetz, as reported by VPM.
Deetz, who educated the public about the house’s former slaves, had been hired during the Northam administration and her position since Youngkin took office in January was reportedly unclear. Last month she told VPM that she arrived at the mansion to find that her office had been emptied, that period pieces on loan from historic sites had been moved, and a TV had been placed inside of what was planned as an education space for mansion visitors.
Ethan told The Washington Post on Sunday that the posted photo of him was deleted more than 12 hours after it was tweeted and that he did not receive an apology.
“A governor’s campaign account has attacked a minor — to me that was a new low,” he told the Post. “I received no apology, no communication, nothing.”
Matt Wolking, a consultant at Axiom Strategies which VPM reported has helped run Youngkin’s campaign, said in a statement to VPM that the tweet was removed after learning that it came from a minor. An apology was not issued.
A spokesperson for Youngkin did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment. Youngkin addressed the incident in a tweet Monday, calling the initial post “unauthorized.”