On Thursday night, ESPN’s Mark Jones tweeted he will refuse police protection on Saturday when he is scheduled to work the game between Army and No. 16 Cincinnati at Nippert Stadium.
Citing his own safety, the ESPN college football play-by-play announcer said he did not want an officer assigned to him.
“Saturday at my football game I’ll tell the police officer on duty to ‘protect’ me he can just take the day off,” Jones wrote. “I’d rather not have the officer shoot me because he feared for his life because of my Black skin or other dumb ish. I’m not signing my own death certificate.”
In a subsequent tweet he tagged with Breonna Taylor’s name and a message to defund the police, Jones then also wrote: “Police never saved me. Never helped me. Never protected me. Never taken a bullet for me. (They’ve pulled guns on me) Never kept me safe in a protest. Never stopped the racist from taking my Black Lives Matter flag off my house. I could do without em. fr.”
Following those two tweets, Jones also went back and clarified some pro-police tweets he had posted in the past.
Jones has worked at ESPN since 1990, according to USA Today.
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