Moonbats still don’t get it.
The New York Knicks will travel across the pond to play the Washington Wizards in London on Jan. 17. But when they do, their starting center will not make the trip with them.
It’s not that Enes Kanter is struggling (averaging 14.4 points per game with 10.7 rebounds), it’s that he does not feel safe traveling to Europe.
Although the team initially said Kanter could not travel due to a visa issue, over the weekend he said it was because of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
“Sadly, I’m not going because of that freaking lunatic, the Turkish president,” Kanter said. “There’s a chance that I can get killed out there. So that’s why I talked to the [Knicks’] front office. I’m not going.”
“It’s pretty sad that just all this stuff affects my career and basketball because I want to be out there helping my team win,” he added. “But just because of that one lunatic guy, one maniac or dictator, I can’t even go out there and just do my job. So it’s pretty sad.”
Kanter spoke out against Turkey’s de facto dictator in 2016 following a failed coup d’etat attempt on him in a series of tweets. He later called the leader “the Hitler of our century” and was labeled a “terrorist” by Erdogan and has a four-year prison sentence waiting for him in Turkey if he ever returns. His family disowned him, and he has received countless death threats.
That said, Kanter is right to not make the trip, and the situation is a reminder of how lucky we are to have free-speech protections in the United States.