Ben Shapiro, conservative columnist, apologizes for offensive ‘Columbus Day’ video

Conservative columnist Ben Shapiro has apologized via Twitter for an offensive satirical video posted Monday on social media accounts for his Daily Wire website.

The cartoon video essentially portrayed all the indigenous peoples of the Americas as savage cannibals prior to Columbus’s landing and subsequent European colonization.

In a statement attached to his apology tweet posted at 4 p.m. Tuesday, Mr. Shapiro, who was on vacation Monday, said the video was posted without his “input or approval” but that he initially decided to leave it up “in the interests of giving my employees the benefit of the doubt — and in the interests of defending satire more broadly[.]”

“That was a mistake and I apologize fully for it,” he added.

“Yes, the video was satire. In my opinion it was bad satire. It did not fulfill my editorial guidelines,” the 33-year-old author and podcaster said. “It skipped over the grave injustices visited upon Native Americans, and it engaged in broad-based stereotyping. … It has been removed.”

Asked by Twitter user Atticus Goldfinch (@AtticusGF), “Will you take action regarding editorial practices in the future to make sure something like this doesn’t happen again?”, Mr. Shapiro replied, “You bet your ass I will.”

Reaction to Mr. Shapiro’s apology among followers was mixed.

“Wow, your cuckoldry reaches new heights. You’re pathetic,” replied user James Allsup, a self-described paleocon and former Students for Trump member.

“Booooooo,” jeered the account for The Columbia Bugle. “It was funny and satire, don’t cave on this Ben.”

“Never bow to the Left,” the Bugle added moments later.

“It wasn’t just the left. Ben did the right thing,” replied Kathleen McKinley, a conservative blogger and local-TV pundit from Houston.

“While being satire, it was a little far. Ben is hardly ’pathetic’ for removing an unprofessional video that was uploaded without approval,” agreed Twitter user Jesse Rockwell.