Looks like some weekend tweets from Delco Times sports writer Matt Smith pissed off readers.

This morning the newspaper issued a statement and Smith an apology, after he went on a mini-rant ripping Trump supporters and calling them white trash, among other things.

The tweets were deleted, but screen grabbed by a guy on Facebook, because of course they were:

If you’re gonna go for it, then go for it. Get it all out of your system. He certainly didn’t half-ass that rant and he’s certainly not the only local sports writer using social media to express his… “displeasure” with the current political climate.

As you can imagine, various complaints rolled in, resulting in the newspaper issuing this statement via newly-minted editor Joe Hart, who took over for Phil Heron a few weeks ago:

To Our Readers:

Last weekend one of our sports writers, Matt Smith, posted several messages on his Twitter account that alarmed and offended many people.

And you let us know it — through emails, and responses on our Facebook page and through other social media.

I want you to know that Matt’s posts in no way reflect the views or positions of the Daily Times. Anyone who has read this publication for any time knows the high regard we hold for our first responders and medical personnel on the front lines.

Political discourse can get rough sometimes (see: Sound Off) but we should always strive to keep it civil.

To those who were hurt and insulted, we apologize. And we can assure you nothing like this will ever happen again.

Matt has his own statement below.

Thank you for your feedback and for your continued support. You’ve reminded us once more how important the Daily Times is to you — and you to us.

Joe Hart, Editor

Interestingly enough, Delco was pretty lopsided for Hillary Clinton back in 2016, with about 57% of the vote going her way. Only 37% percent of folks (about 110,000) voted for Trump, so one could argue that Smith is actually pandering to a majority of readers instead of insulting a minority, but that’s another story for another time.

Here’s his apology:

To Daily Times Readers:

I am writing to apologize for recent comments I made on Twitter.

Those comments were done in poor taste. It is never OK to make assumptions about a group of people, regardless of their beliefs and how they differ from your own. It was wrong.

I enjoy having a social media platform to discuss various subjects, and I have never believed in sticking to sports. Sometimes, though, you shouldn’t tweet just anything that’s dancing in your head at the time. In this case, I crossed a line.

I am sorry.

For 14 years I have covered local sports in Delaware County and consider this one of the best gigs in journalism. As a Delco native I am very proud of the work that I do.

Let me address one more thing: I have nothing but the utmost respect and appreciation for our local law enforcement and medical personnel. Several Internet postings suggesting otherwise are simply not true.

We should work on being more kind to each other. I’ll start.

Thanks for reading.

Sincerely,

Matt Smith

Smith has been with the Delco Times for a while now, as he mentions in his apology. Looks like the newspaper has his back as well.

The timing of the whole thing is intriguing to me, since Times owner MediaNews Group recently shed a bunch of jobs during the Coronavirus pandemic, offering employees a “voluntary separation plan” that Crossing Broad shared back in April. They could have very easily just fired him for these tweets and moved on, since it seems like they’re trying to reduce the work force in any way possible.

But it’s a bare bones operation already, and Smith is one of the few full timers remaining on the staff, so obviously they feel pretty good about the high school work he does, since other people have been shit-canned outright for lesser transgressions.

Time’s yours.