President Trump’s former press secretary Sean Spicer was accosted at a book signing Friday and accused of having used a racial slur decades earlier.
Mr. Spicer was autographing copies of his new memoir when he was confronted inside a Barnes & Noble book store by a man who claimed the two attended prep school together in Portsmouth, Rhode Island.
“Sean, I was a day student at Abbey, too, with you,” the man said to Mr. Spicer, as captured in video shared by Newport’s Daily News.
“Hey,” Mr. Spicer reacts in the clip. “Yes, how are you?”
“Don’t you remember?” You don’t remember that you tried to fight me? But you called me a [N-word] first,” the man responded.”
The heckler was quickly ushered away from the signing by security, but not before taunting the president’s former spokesman further.
“I was 14 then. I was a scared kid then, Sean. I’m not scared to fight you now,” said the man.
The Providence Journal identified the man as Alex Lombard, a Newport native who claimed that that he graduated from Portsmouth Abbey in 1990, a year after Mr. Spicer. Neither his identity or claim could immediately be independently verified.
Mr. Spicer “can’t recall any incident like this happening” and was “not sure if this was just a stunt this man was pulling,” said Lauren McCue, a publicist for Regnery Publishing, The Associated Press reported.
Mr. Trump’s former spokesman was “taken aback” by the man’s “outrageous” accusation, a White House aide added.
The altercation occurred at a Barnes & Noble in Middletown, Rhode Island, on the heels of a similar incident days earlier.
“Hey Sean, you’re a real piece of garbage and I hope you look around and see all these empty seats,” a man should to Mr. Spicer during his Wednesday book signing at the Union Square Barnes & Noble in downtown Manhattan. “And I hope you realize in even in New York City people will not come and pay to hear you speak.”
A book signing previously scheduled for Saturday, meanwhile, was canceled earlier this week “due to the political climate,” according to Regnery.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.