Miami Herald Sportswriter Defends Three-Fifths Compromise'>
- The Miami Dolphins are going back to London in 2017. I am being told the Dolphins have been selected by the NFL to play a game in London next season, marking the fourth time overall and third time.
- — Armando Salguero (@ArmandoSalguero) August 28, 2020 Salguero was born in Cuba and has written about his escape from Cuba under Fidel Castro. The comment drew criticism on Twitter over several.
- Armando Salguero, a Miami Herald columnist who has railed against protests and Colin Kaepernick, calls NFL players 'dogs' and coaches 'masters.'
Miami Herald columnist Armando Salguero—who has covered the Miami Dolphins longer than many players on the current roster have been alive—and Dolphins reporter Adam Beasley break down everything you need to know about the Fins. Armando Salguero on Twitter Injury Report - Spoiler this may be rough.
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Update, 5:45 p.m.: This story has been updated to include a response from Miami Herald executive editor Mindy Marques.
In the midst of protests against racial injustice by athletes around the U.S., Miami Herald sports columnist Armando Salguero took to Twitter to call the athletes 'America-bashing' people and to defend the three-fifths compromise, a clause in the U.S. Constitution that classified slaves as three-fifths of a person in population counts.
After police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, shot Jacob Blake, an unarmed Black man, last Sunday, a number of athletes have protested by not showing up to scheduled games or walking off without playing, including the Milwaukee Bucks and the Miami Marlins. Several teams have also issued video statements about the strikes while wearing Black Lives Matter shirts.
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Yesterday, Salguero retweeted a video of the Tennessee Titans and their quarterback, Ryan Tannehill, who said America was founded on 'racist ideas.' Salguero, who has written of his escape from Cuba with his mother when he was a child, responded that he is 'so sick of the America bashing by people who have never lived and would never live anywhere else.'
Ryan Tannehill says the United States of America “was founded upon racist ideas...”
I am so sick of the America bashing by people who have never lived and would never live anywhere else.pic.twitter.com/xHgA8nHvyN
Miami Herald publisher and executive editor Mindy Marques tells New Times that Salguero's opinions 'do not reflect the views of the Miami Herald.'
'The right to free expression and a free press are foundational to our democracy,' she said in an email. 'Armando Salguero is a Miami Herald sports columnist and unlike reporters, columnists have broad latitude to express their opinions.'
Salguero's tweet echoes the call of people on the opposite side of the Black Lives Matter movement who argue, essentially, that if you don't like it here, you can leave. Those critics posit that America is better than other countries and therefore immune to criticism about its oppressive past.
In the comments on Salguero's tweet, a staff writer for the Dallas Cowboys website pointed out that a provision in the U.S. Constitution defines Black people as 'being worth 3/5 of a person.' Salguero responded by posting a link to a video by PragerU, a conservative online platform, that claims the three-fifths compromise was 'anti-slavery.'
— Armando Salguero (@ArmandoSalguero) August 28, 2020
The three-fifths compromise, or three-fifths clause, was a deal struck between Northern and Southern delegates at the Constitutional Convention in 1787. When counting the population to determine how much representation each state would receive in Congress, the South would have benefited by counting all of its enslaved people, while the North would have benefited if only free people were counted.
In the end, it was decided that the enslaved population would only count for three-fifths of its total number for the purposes of taxation and apportionment. While it does not explicitly say that Black people had three-fifths status, many have contended that the language implies that enslaved people were not worth as much as their free, white counterparts.
Salguero went on to opine that because the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are built upon free speech and equality for all men, America was not built on racist ideals. (It's unclear how the fact that the nation was built on slavery and the idea that people were considered property based on skin color, or that legal segregation was a thing, fits into that view.)
Several of Salguero's Miami Herald colleagues responded to him on Twitter, arguing against his perspective and offering their own.
'Because once slavery ended, that was it. Blacks were immediately embraced by all Americans with equal rights and opportunities...(Written in Sarcasm Font),' wrote Herald reporter David J. Neal, who is Black.
Colleen Wright, a Herald education reporter and a Cuban-American, tried to offer a balanced perspective by saying that a person can love their country while still recognizing its faults and racist history.
Ya know, both things can be true. A country can be beautiful and welcoming and prosperous for one group of people. Armando — and my family — are in that group.
That same country continues to kill generations of another group of people for the color of their skin. https://t.co/15Wf3uJUvJ
Wright continued by apologizing to readers for Salguero's comments.
'It should be clear — and sadly it STILL isn't clear to my colleague — black lives matter,' Wright wrote. 'Armando's tweet is so gaslighting & as a Miami Herald reporter, I am so sorry. Our readers deserve better.'
Last night's tweet is far from Salguero's first social-media tirade against civil-rights demonstrations in sports.
In November 2016, after confronting San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick during a conference call before a matchup between the visiting 49ers and the Miami Dolphins, Salguero wrote a column deeming Kaepernick a 'fraud' and an 'unrepentant hypocrite' for wearing a T-shirt that depicted a 1960 meeting between Fidel Castro and Malcolm X. Last year, as New Times reported, Salguero tweeted that he would 'rather have Satan' as a quarterback than Kaepernick, who had been blacklisted by the NFL for kneeling during the national anthem to protest social injustice.
Before that, Salguero wrote a column in which he referred to football coaches as 'masters' and players as 'dogs' who live to serve and respond to conditioning.
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The Miami Herald severely chastised its own sportswriter for pushing back against NFL athletes who said that America was founded upon “racist ideas.”
Herald columnist Armando Salguero, recently got fed up with the NFL’s constant anti-American drumbeat. Specifically citing comments by Tennessee Titans quarterback Ryan Tannehill and other players, Salguero took to Twitter in defense of America.
Salguero added to his August 27 tweet a video of the Titans’ millionaire players complaining about the “systemic racism” in America, while justifying boycotting practice.
“I am so sick of the America bashing by people who have never lived and would never live anywhere else,” the Cuba-born columnist wrote.
Ryan Tannehill says the United States of America “was founded upon racist ideas…”
I am so sick of the America bashing by people who have never lived and would never live anywhere else.pic.twitter.com/xHgA8nHvyN
— Armando Salguero (@ArmandoSalguero) August 28, 2020
Salguero said in response to critical sports writers, “ideas upon which America was founded…freedom of speech, religion, peaceable assembly, right to bear arms, all men created equal. Now you name the racist ideas upon which country was founded.”
Steve, ideas upon which America was founded…freedom of speech, religion, peaceable assembly, right to bear arms, all men created equal. Now you name the racist ideas upon which country was founded.
— Armando Salguero (@ArmandoSalguero) August 28, 2020
Mindy Marques, the Herald’s publisher and executive editor, took to Twitter to say that Salguero’s beliefs about the founding of our country “do not reflect the views of the Miami Herald.”
The right to free expression and a free press are foundational to our democracy. @ArmandoSalguero is a @MiamiHerald sports columnist and unlike reporters, columnists have broad latitude to express their opinions. Those opinions do not reflect the views of the Miami Herald. https://t.co/MAIgDrT975
— Mindy Marques (@MindyMarques) August 28, 2020
However, the next day, Marques delivered a stronger salvo against her patriotic writer. After saying that she had been listening to feedback from Herald staff and readers, Marques apologized for Salguero’s “deeply troubling” and “insensitive” remarks.
She then made it clear that in the Herald’s, America was indeed founded upon racism.
We want to state an incontrovertible truth: Our country was built by enslaved people, and the very fact of their enslavement is racist. It is troubling that this factual information and legacy of injustice are not more widely understood.
— Mindy Marques (@MindyMarques) August 29, 2020
We remain committed to highlighting the social injustices that still exist today through our reporting, including our recent series on racial and economic disparities.
— Mindy Marques (@MindyMarques) August 29, 2020
As to the “source that is not credible,” Marques was referring to a Prager U video hosted by black educator Carol Swain. Salguero had linked to the video which factually explains what the Constitution’s 3/5th Clause means.
Salguero later sought to clarify that he did not intend to be dismissive of problems regarding racism and slavery:
Armando Salguero Twitter
As our nation grapples with racism and the legacy of slavery, I made some comments on Twitter Thursday night that I would like to address: Racism in all its forms is disgusting, wrong, and an anathema to every fiber of my being as both an American and a Christian. I believe every one of us is made in the image of God and we are all literally related, dating back to Eden. I do not deny that the truth about on-going racism or that slavery has been a stain on the entire Earth. That would be historically illiterate and immoral.
So, if anyone who sincerely interpreted my comments to suggest otherwise I assure you that is not what I’m about, and it was not my intent to cause anyone pain.
Armando Salguero Miami Herald Twitter
A statement… pic.twitter.com/G7LA9J4gvr
— Armando Salguero (@ArmandoSalguero) August 31, 2020
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