NBA star LeBron James was slammed on social media on Wednesday for mocking teenager Kyle Rittenhouse’s emotional testimony during which the defendant cried on the witness stand.
“What tears????? I didn’t see one,” James tweeted. “Man knock it off! That boy ate some lemon heads before walking into court.”
Dozens of prominent Twitter users immediately called out James for the attack.
“Lebron, great defender of the Chinese government’s tyranny, also happens to be an unparalleled dumpster fire in the field of criminal justice,” the Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro tweeted.
Political commentator Stephen Miller shared on Twitter a photo of James crying and being carried off the basketball court over a cramp.
“He’s crying because he had to shoot someone and take a life in self defense,” Miller tweeted. “You cried because you got a cramp.”
American Military News previously reported that Kyle Rittenhouse broke down in tears during his trial Wednesday morning after taking the witness stand to describe the events of August 25, 2020, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, where the then 17-year-old shot multiple rioters, killing two. Rittenhouse maintains that he was acting in self-defense.
Some speculated that Rittenhouse displayed symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder when he broke down on the stand.
“LeBron James appears to be mocking people dealing with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in this post,” tweeted City Councilman Aaron Carpenter. “Why? Is this a joke to you? Not a good look!”
“Why is @KingJames on the wrong side of every issue? When you revisit traumatic memories it comes out differently emotionally and/or psychically,” Harminder Singh tweeted. “Understand the subject before commenting on it.”
Author and candidate for Congress Graham Allen tweeted a photo of LeBron flopping on the basketball court and wrote that “no one knows how to fake something better than you.”
Another Twitter user responded to Allen’s tweet of a close-up photo of LeBron breaking down in tears himself.
This isn’t the first time that James has been criticized for his controversial comments on Twitter. Earlier this year, James tweeted a picture of an officer involved in the fatal shooting of 16-year-old black girl Ma’Khia Bryant, who charged at another girl with a knife. The officer is being credited with helping save the other black girl’s life.
In a now-deleted tweet, James said, “YOU’RE NEXT” with an image of an hourglass and the hashtag “#ACCOUNTABILITY.”
James has also echoed Chinese Communist Party propaganda, including comments that Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey was “misinformed” when he expressed his support for Hong Kong amid more than four months of demonstrations in the city against increasing Chinese authority.
At the time, James warned about the negative consequences of having the freedom of speech and said “many people could have been harmed, not only financially, but physically, emotionally, spiritually,” by Morey’s comments in support of the Hong Kong protests.
