Sheng Peng
San Jose Sharks captain Logan Couture tweeted this morning that he was punched on Tuesday night in Toronto after publicly expressing support for the Republican Party and for mentioning Donald Trump.
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298587388499972096
Couture explained his position over a number of replies:
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298618545430056962
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298606619375403008
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298590359489064961
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298592061822730241
Couture did not report any injuries in the aftermath of the assault.
Many on Twitter, however, were quick to point out the apparent incongruity between Couture’s support in May of teammate Evander Kane’s push to eradicate racism in hockey and other spaces with today’s support of a political party headed by a man who is still actively using racist terminology like “China virus.”
https://twitter.com/leahflame/status/1298601719878754311
Couture also responded to Tara Slone of Sportsnet for Liking this tweet:
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298612152119459844
I’ve reached out to the San Jose Sharks for official comment. More on this story as it develops.
UPDATE:
Couture tweeted this after this story’s original publication:
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298668343373832192
However, Couture declined further comment at this time:
It appears that Couture has deleted his tweet to Slone. He’s also apologized to her:
Couture has also released this statement:
https://twitter.com/Logancouture/status/1298729057442566147
He has also deleted his original tweet.
Shortly thereafter, the San Jose Sharks released their own statement: “The San Jose Sharks organization is aware of the incident that occurred on the evening of Aug. 25 in which Logan Couture was assaulted in Toronto. We are thankful that he was not seriously hurt and unequivocally denounce physical attacks or abuse on anyone under any circumstances.”
ADDENDUM:
The story isn’t about me, but I made a mistake with my original title, which stated, “Logan Couture Was Punched for Supporting Donald Trump, GOP”. Couture did clarify, as noted earlier in this story, that he doesn’t like Trump. While it can be inferred from his tweets this morning that he would vote for Trump even if he doesn’t like him — which is support — it’s not clearly stated, which is why I’ve revised the title of the story.
I had left the original tweet up as an admission of my mistake and because there was nuanced conversation going on in the replies, but since that tweet with the inaccurate title is still being shared, it’s probably best to just delete it. It is screen capped in the above link though. My apologies for the poor reporting in that title and thanks to those who pointed out my mistake.