A NASCAR driver will debut a Trump 2020 car in the Brickyard 400 race against Bubba Wallace this weekend, just weeks after the black driver found a ‘noose’ in his garage at another event.
Corey LaJoie, 28, will take to the tracks this Sunday in his newly painted Ford Mustang which will have ‘Trump 2020’ splashed across the hood and rear-quarter panels, his race team announced Wednesday.
Go Fas Racing revealed the new design for the number 32 car ahead of the race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Indianapolis, this weekend and pledged its support for Donald Trump’s reelection campaign.
A NASCAR driver will take to the tracks this Sunday in his newly painted Ford Mustang which will have ‘Trump 2020’ splashed across the hood and rear-quarter panels (pictured), his race team announced Wednesday
‘I am honored to be part of the President’s re-election campaign through the Patriots of America PAC,’ team owner Archie St. Hilaire said in a statement.
‘As a Trump 2020 supporter, this team will do everything possible to secure victory on and off the track electing President Donald Trump to a second term.’
LaJoie said he hoped the design would spur more racing fans to vote in the upcoming election.
‘With an estimated 75 million NASCAR fans out there, I was surprised that about 15 million of those fans are not registered voters,’ he said Wednesday.
‘I will give my best effort to get NASCAR fans registered to vote, through our team efforts on and off the track. When they see the car, hopefully, it makes them race to the polls in November.’
The blue, red and white design also features ‘Your Vote Counts’ symbols and was created in partnership with the pro-Trump Patriots of America PAC.
The overt show of Trump propaganda on LaJoie’s car at the upcoming event comes after Wallace debuted a Black Lives Matter paint design on his car at Martinsville Speedway in Virginia in early June. He is driving a different blue design this weekend.
Corey LaJoie, 28, (right) will debut the Trump 2020 car in the Brickyard 400 race against Bubba Wallace (left) this weekend, just weeks after the black driver found a ‘noose’ in his garage at another event
Go Fas Racing revealed the new design for LaJoie’s number 32 car ahead of the race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. This comes after Wallace, 26, debuted a Black Lives Matter paint design on his car at Martinsville Speedway in Virginia in early June
Wallace, the only black NASCAR driver, found himself at the center of a suspected hate crime when a ‘noose’ was found in his garage stall at Talladega Speedway on June 21.
Wallace, 26, had only two weeks earlier led calls for the Confederate flag to be banned from NASCAR venues and races.
NASCAR agreed to ban the flag and both the company and Wallace faced a major backlash from their southern fans.
One driver on NASCAR’s truck series, Ray Ciccarelli, vowed to retire at season’s end over the move due to his objections while a group called the Sons of Confederate Veterans arranged for a small propeller plane to fly the Confederate Flag over the northern Alabama race track before the scheduled race and a caravan of cars paraded the rebel banner in front of Talladega’s main entrance.
The discovery of the noose-like rope sparked fears Wallace was the target of a racist attack.
All 39 other NASCAR drivers rallied in support of Wallace at the race’s restart the following day, collectively pushing his No. 43 car to the front of the grid in a show of solidarity.
Wallace, the only black NASCAR driver, found himself at the center of a suspected hate crime when a ‘noose’ was found in his garage stall at Talladega Speedway on June 21. All 39 other NASCAR drivers rallied in support of Wallace before Monday’s restart (pictured) following the discovery of the noose, collectively pushing his No. 43 car to the front of the grid in a show of solidarity
NASCAR released a photo of the suspected ‘noose’ found in Wallace’s garage stall which was investigated by the FBI as a possible hate crime before being revealed to be an innocent garage door pull rope that had been in use for at least a year
Wallace, an Alabama native, became overwhelmed with emotion and fought back tears as his car owner, NASCAR legend Richard Petty, gave him a hug in the moments before the race began.
NASCAR and the FBI both launched investigations into the ‘noose’, which revealed the rope was in fact a garage door pull-down rope that was previously used in the same stall by a white driver, Paul Menard, in 2019.
Footage from earlier years showed similar garage door pulls being used by other drivers, although none appeared to look exactly like a ‘noose’ in the same way the rope in Wallace’s stall did.
Wallace had only two weeks before the ‘noose’ incident led calls for the Confederate flag to be banned from NASCAR venues and races. Some southern fans were outrage and flew the Confederate Flag over the northern Alabama race track before the scheduled race and a caravan of cars paraded the rebel banner in front of Talladega’s main entrance (pictured)
According to US Attorney Jay Town and FBI Special Agent Johnnie Sharp Jr., nobody could have known that Wallace would be assigned that specific stall prior to last weekend’s race.
Circuit officials questioned representatives from every NASCAR track to learn exactly how many garage door pull-down ropes were tied in a similar manner.
Of the 1,684 stalls across 29 tracks, only 11 had knotted pull-down ropes, and just one of those had been fashioned into a noose – the one in Wallace’s stall – according to NASCAR.com.
Some people have slammed the investigation over the rope a ‘hoax’ and saying NASCAR had somehow overreacted over the shocking incident.
Wallace hit back at the accusations saying the whole experience was ‘just short of pure hell’ for him and that the ‘common denominator is racism’.
Brickyard 400, the annual 400-mile NASCAR Cup Series points race, will take place on Sunday at 1 p.m. local Indiana time.