(LifeSiteNews) — Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has expressed support for LGBCoin, a crypto currency named for the viral anti-Biden “Let’s Go Brandon” chant, whose sponsorship deal with race car driver Brandon Brown was rejected by NASCAR last week.
“I’m very much in favor of letting people speak their mind however they want to do it,” DeSantis said at a press conference Thursday. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with LGBCoin.”
The phrase “Let’s Go Brandon” has became a cultural phenomenon after an NBC reporter interviewing winning driver Brandon Brown at the Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama inaccurately stated that the racetrack audience were chanting “Let’s Go Brandon” when they were actually chanting “F*** Joe Biden.” While the vulgar chant had already been a national trend at football stadiums, rallies, and other events, conservatives immediately picked up “Let’s Go Brandon” as a humorous and coded way to denounce Biden while simultaneously slamming the legacy media for “gaslighting” the public.
DeSantis’s sympathy for LGBCoin comes after NASCAR drew a firestorm of controversy for rejecting a sponsorship deal between the crypto currency and Brandon Brown’s team. LGBCoin had been signed as a full-season primary partner for the 2022 NASCAR XFinity series season by Brown’s team in late December before NASCAR’s rejection of the deal last week.
According to Forbes, Brown’s car would have sported the LBGcoin.io logo and would have been “wrapped in a red, white, and blue livery for the upcoming season.”
NEWS: @LGBcoin_io joins @brandonbrown_68 and Brandonbilt Motorsports as full season primary partner for the 2022 @NASCAR_Xfinity Series season!
Press release: https://t.co/N2pgIdgsnt pic.twitter.com/yiOq3d0R7P
— Brandonbilt Motorsports (@BMSRaceTeam) December 30, 2021
On Tuesday, however, the agreement was struck down by officials at NASCAR who “reviewed the sponsorship and decided not to approve the deal” just days after the sponsorship was announced, the New York Post reported.
Some consider NASCAR’s decision an unfair punishment for Brown, while others have accused the company of hypocrisy, pointing out that NASCAR had permitted driver Bubba Wallace to sport politically divisive “Black Lives Matter” sponsorship decals in 2020, and had even allowed cars to display Trump 2020 emblems.
Hey @NASCAR #gowokegobroke. Deplorable way to follow up how you broke the law to punish @brandonbrown_68 for being in the wrong place when @NBCNews @KelliStavast blatantly lied on national tv to create #LetsGoBrandon. Time to #CancelNascar https://t.co/PyhhoKXNCI
— James Koutoulas (@jameskoutoulas) January 6, 2022
Prior to signing LGBCoin as a sponsor, Brandon Brown had avoided affirming or rejecting the “Let’s Go Brandon” chant, writing several opinion pieces distancing himself from any political party and penning a piece for Newsweek in which he attempted to adjust the chant to a possibly less divisive “Let’s Go America.”
In his statements Thursday DeSantis acknowledged Brown’s passive role in the viral trend, remarking, “First of all, it wasn’t Brandon’s fault that any of this happened. If you remember what happened, he was being interviewed at a NASCAR race. There were fans in the crowd who were chanting very colorful language about Biden.”
“It was obvious that’s what was happening,” DeSantis continued. “Then the reporter, and I don’t know why, ran interference on that and said they’re chanting ‘Let’s Go Brandon,’ isn’t that great. That’s why it took off, because people are looking at it and saying, ‘You’re gaslighting us again, and we’re sick of it.’”
Regardless of his attempts to distance himself from politics, Brown nonetheless made headlines again when NASCAR rejected the chant-aligned sponsor.
While NASCAR has not yet issued a public statement regarding the situation, in a statement to the Washington Post a spokesperson addressed complaints that NASCAR had backtracked on its deal with LGBCoin, arguing that the sponsorship had never been granted formal approval.
For its part, LGBCoin appears inclined to oppose NASCAR’s decision without going through legal channels.
“For now, instead of legal action, Brown’s sponsor is reacting in a different way,” Forbes reported, noting that “[o]n Saturday Brown and LGBCoin.io announced an extension of the sponsorship and a personal services contract,” in a move the sponsor described as “doubling down” on the deal.
“The partnership between Brandon Brown and the pro-America crypto coin will include personal participation in publicity events, videos, crypto conferences, racing-related events and more, though won’t include car decals,” LGBCoin stated in a press release, Forbes reported.
“That seems to indicate that fans won’t be seeing an LGBcoin themed car racing on the track, at least any time soon,” the outlet continued, but suggested that since NASCAR pays little attention to “personal services contracts,” Brown “may have just found a way to take advantage of his viral fame while seeming to thumb his nose at NASCAR.”
Brown isn’t the only one finding a way to capitalize on the chant. DeSantis’s support of LGBCoin’s sponsorship deal and disapproval of NASCAR’s decision to reject it scores him yet another victory among his base, who continue to view him as a strong candidate for the 2024 presidential election.
DeSantis had jumped onto the “Let’s Go Brandon” bandwagon early on, jokingly referring to the Biden administration in November as the “Brandon administration. Later that month, DeSantis signed legislation blocking COVID-19 vaccine mandates in his state, trolling Biden by doing so in Brandon, Florida.
While it rejects the LGBCoin, NASCAR has embraced the LGBT agenda: last week it announced that it has partnered with an LGBTQ+ organization to “promote diversity, equity, and inclusion training.”