WNBA player Dijonai Carrington invited a flurry of backlash for wearing a shirt that said “the F—Donald Trump tour,” and conservative influencer Riley Gaines was quick to pounce.
Carrington showed off the shirt on Friday, entering Wayfair Arena in Miami, Florida. Carrington is best known for her interactions with women’s basketball phenom Caitlin Clark during Clark’s 2024 WNBA rookie season.
Carrington infamously gave Clark Black an eye by poking her with her fingernails during a game between the Clark Indiana Fever and Carrington’s Connecticut Sun in the first round of the playoffs in September. Carrington laughed with Fever teammate Marina Mabrey after the incident.
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Gaines made light of this in his first review of Carrington on Saturday.
“So you’re telling me the same girl who deliberately made eye contact with Caitlin Clark, then laughed about it in a post on X.
Carrington said she did not intentionally make eye contact with Clark and was not laughing about the incident. But Gaines felt no reservations about implying Carrington’s shooting of Clark and laughing about it afterward.
Gaines followed up with another review of the Sun Player and even brought LeBron James into the conversation.
“What did Donald Trump do to make your life worse? Keep LeBron off the court,” Gaines wrote on X in response to a photo of Carrington wearing the shirt.
Carrington provoked Clark fans before the peeping incident with several statements berating Clark and his fan base.
During a game in June, Carrington stepped up Clark after Clark received an inbounds pass from teammate Kristy Wallace. Clark grabbed the pass and started toward the basket. Carrington was late to Clark due to a screen from Aliyah Boston, and she ran into Clark.
Caitlin Clark, right, of the Indiana Fever, fouls to Dijonai Carrington (21) of the Connecticut Sun during the first half at Mohegan Sun Arena on June 10, 2024, in Uncasville, Conn. (Brian Fluharty/Getty Images)
Later this month, Carrington Published on xsaying Clark should do more to speak out about people using his name for “racism” and other forms of prejudice. She also called Fever fans the “meanest” in the league.
Carrington even made light of Clark’s Black Eye controversy in an Instagram Live video in October. In the video, Carrington and his girlfriend, Nalyssa Smith, who stars on Indiana Fever with Clark, were in their kitchen when Smith poked Carrington in the eye.
“Ow, you poked me in the eye,” Carrington said. Smith apologized and the two laughed.
“Did you do it on purpose?” Carrington asked.
Carrington isn’t the first target of Gaines’ ire when it comes to conversations about Clark’s presence in the WNBA.
After Clark made a comment On benefiting from white privilege in the WNBA during her interview for Time magazine’s Athlete of the Year, Gaines got into a back-and-forth with journalist Jemele Hill.
After Gaines posted on X criticizing Clark for making the comments, Hill started the debate and even ended up making it personal.
“You shout about supporting and ‘protecting’ women all the time, and yet the moment Caitlin Clark expresses appreciation and respect for black women in the WNBA (many of whom she grew up watching and idolizing), suddenly , you act like you A disappointed parent,” Hill wrote.
Riley Gaines repeatedly rips into AOC for removing pronouns from X Bio after defending trans athletes
Riley Gaines is sworn in during a House Oversight Subcommittee on Health Care and Financial Services on Capitol Hill December 5, 2023, in Washington, DC (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Gaines quickly clapped back, responding to Hill’s post by mocking the idea of ”white privilege” in the WNBA.
“The ‘white privilege’ in the WNBA is literally hilarious. Maybe you’re like Sunny Hostin & Think CC also has great privilege, privilege and straight privilege,” Gaines wrote. “There are a lot of players blacks in the WNBA that I love [and] Respect too, but I don’t admire them because they are black. I admire them for their game. That’s the difference. ”
Gaines then doubled down by sharing Hill’s initial post with a screenshot of comments the reporter made in an interview with the Los Angeles Times in May. In that article, Hill insisted that it was “naive” to say that Clark’s race and sexuality as a straight woman did not play into her popularity in the WNBA, where the majority of players are black and many are lesbians.
“Being a long-time professional racer must be so exhausting,” Gaines told Hill in response.
After Gaines’ comment about Hill being a professional racer, Hill responded with a post mocking the former swimmer for an incident when she tied with trans athlete Lia Thomas at the women’s swimming championships of the 2022 NCAA.
“Girl, you have to thank Lia Thomas every day of your life for helping you become famous, otherwise you would have just been a decent college swimmer that no one knew about. You wrote the book on Grifting – not me,” wrote Hill.
Former President Donald Trump is joined on stage by Riley Gaines at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas, Texas, August 6, 2022. (Reuters/Brian Snyder)
Gaines responded by saying, “How deeply regressive [and] Quite misogynistic for Jemele Hill to tell me to thank a man for the platform I have. Thank him for what? Rape us in the locker room? Stealing a national title from a deserving woman? Indirectly strip us of our 1A rights? Just say you hate women,” Gaines wrote in his response.
This was the last message in the exchange.
Gaines has also picked fights online with other liberal figures, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Dallas Mavericks minority owner Mark Cuban.
Each of Gaines’ spats with liberal figures have been met with roaring commitment from his followers.
