Noose Found in NASCAR Driver Bubba Wallace’s Garage

NASCAR has launched an investigation after a noose was found in Bubba Wallace’s garage stall. NASCAR has released this statement below:

“Late this afternoon, NASCAR was made aware that a noose was found in the garage stall of the 43 team. We are angry and outraged, and cannot state strongly enough how seriously we take this heinous act. We have launched an immediate investigation, and will do everything we can to identify the person(s) responsible and eliminate them from the sport. As we have stated unequivocally, there is no place for racism in NASCAR, and this act only strengthens our resolve to make the sport open and welcoming to all.

NASCAR held a teleconference for media members today where they interviewed NASCAR President Steve Phelps.

“Thank you.  Good afternoon, everyone.  Appreciate your time on short notice.  As we have stated unequivocally, there is no place for racism in NASCAR.  This act only strengthens our resolve to make this sport open and welcoming to all. Before I open it up to a few brief questions, I want to summarize in a very short order what happened yesterday afternoon.

Late yesterday afternoon a crew member from the 43 team discovered a noose in the 43 garage stall.  That crew member informed NASCAR.  NASCAR security got involved.  I got a small group of senior leaders in the sport at NASCAR together to try to determine what the next steps would be.

First thing was to launch an immediate investigation into this heinous act.  As part of that, we this morning at 7:30 notified the Birmingham office of the FBI.  They are currently on-site.  They’ve started their investigation. We are, as I said, in the early stages of this.  We will continue to keep the media informed as we learn more.  Obviously this is a very, very serious act.  We take it as such.  We will do everything in our power to make sure that whoever has committed this act comes to justice and comes to light and we rid this type of behavior from our sport.”

When asked about who had access to the garage and was ultimately responsible Phelps responded with:

 “As you are aware, we have a very small number of people that are in the footprint, only essential personnel there.  Obviously we’ll review the entire list with the FBI about who had access at that particular time. We also use something called ‘compartmentalization’.  We’ll look at who was in that particular area.  We’ll be able to narrow that down. Again, getting into the specifics about what the FBI is going to do working with our security people, it’s kind of too early to determine.  I don’t have access to the information at this point.”

“Unequivocally they will be banned from this sport for life.  There is no room for this at all.  We won’t tolerate it.  They won’t be here.  I don’t care who they are, they will not be here. I had the opportunity to speak with the King this morning.  He and I met in person.  He is resolved, and his team, to figure out how we work together to get this solved and figure out the person who did this act.”

NASCAR drivers were quick to come to Bubba’s defense and stood in solidarity with a momentous showing of support by pushing his #43 car to the front of the pack during pre-race activities.

Team owner Richard Petty also made his support clear. 

Wallace was very emotional but wanted to keep pushing a positive message.

“Over the last several weekends, I have been overwhelmed by the support from people across the NASCAR industry including other dreams and team members in the garages, Together, our sport has made a commitment to driving real change and championing a community that is accepting and welcoming of everyone. Nothing is more important and we will not be deterred by the reprehensible actions of those who seek to spread hate.

“As my mother told me today, ‘They are just trying to scare you,’ ” Wallace tweeted Sunday night. “This will not break me, I will not give in nor will I back down. I will continue to proudly stand for what I believe in.”