{"id":1102701,"date":"2021-12-09T13:29:05","date_gmt":"2021-12-09T18:29:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1102701"},"modified":"2021-12-09T13:29:08","modified_gmt":"2021-12-09T18:29:08","slug":"a-lets-go-brandon-boat-won-a-virginia-parade-contest-then-organizers-stripped-its-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/a-lets-go-brandon-boat-won-a-virginia-parade-contest-then-organizers-stripped-its-award\/","title":{"rendered":"A \u2018Let\u2019s Go Brandon\u2019 Boat Won a Virginia Parade Contest. Then Organizers Stripped Its Award."},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">30<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fa-lets-go-brandon-boat-won-a-virginia-parade-contest-then-organizers-stripped-its-award%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1102701&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Screen-Shot-2021-12-09-at-12.52.37-PM_736x514.png\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p>A boat displaying the anti-Biden slogan &#8220;Let&#8217;s Go Brandon&#8221; was disqualified from its first-place finish in a Virginia parade contest.<\/p>\n<p>A panel of judges for Yorktown, Virginia&#8217;s annual Christmas boat parade on Saturday awarded Captain Bill Berger&#8217;s 50-foot craft, <em>Southern Rock<\/em>, &#8220;best of show&#8221; for its light display, which included the popular slogan and the initials &#8220;FJB.&#8221; After receiving complaints from some residents, however, the parade&#8217;s sponsor, the Yorktown Foundation, rescinded the award, saying the boat&#8217;s &#8220;overt political message&#8221; could jeopardize the nonprofit&#8217;s tax-exempt status.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;While we recognize that political divisiveness is a factor in our daily discourse, we DO NOT want it to negatively impact anyone&#8217;s enjoyment of our community events,&#8221; the foundation said in a statement. &#8220;We regret that this incident occurred, and we will work to avoid such events in the future.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Let&#8217;s Go Brandon&#8221; has become a popular anti-Biden rallying cry at public events across the country. The slogan comes from an October NASCAR interview in which an NBC Sports reporter incorrectly claimed attendees who chanted &#8220;Fuck Joe Biden&#8221; were saying &#8220;Let&#8217;s Go Brandon&#8221; in support of driver Brandon Brown.<\/p>\n<p>Berger defended his light display, saying event organizers were aware of his boat&#8217;s anti-Biden theme. The boat captain also said &#8220;FJB&#8221; stands for &#8220;falling Joe Biden,&#8221; saying, &#8220;If you choose to interpret \u2018bad words&#8217; that&#8217;s on you.&#8221; The boat included a display of President Joe Biden falling off a ladder.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have a horrible president,&#8221; Berger told a local news affiliate. &#8220;Is it inappropriate? In today&#8217;s world, I don&#8217;t think so.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Yorktown Foundation director Walt Akers, who led the effort to strip Berger of his prize, admitted the captain&#8217;s boat display was &#8220;beautiful.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The guy did a great display. If it wasn&#8217;t just for this political issue, I think the guy would have had a very good chance,&#8221; Akers <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wtkr.com\/news\/boat-in-yorktown-parade-disqualified-for-controversial-political-message\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">told<\/a> a local news outlet. &#8220;The crowd was very responsive to it, and I think it&#8217;s possible the judges may have responded to the crowd activity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Some shoreline spectators joined the boat crew in the \u2018Let&#8217;s go, Brandon&#8217; chant as the vessel passed,&#8221; Virginia&#8217;s <em>Daily Press<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailypress.com\/news\/dp-nw-york-boat-parade-20211207-zxfmnbckkrby3otnaset4zn2ry-story.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The parade committee has awarded the &#8220;best of show&#8221; prize to the second-place finisher, a display called &#8220;Peace on Earth.&#8221; Berger, meanwhile, says &#8220;Internet people&#8221; are attacking his boat and crew over the anti-Biden display.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What I regret right now is the attacks,&#8221; Berger told a local news outlet. &#8220;The attacks from the Internet people to the people on my boat. \u2026 I&#8217;ve got my people, my crew getting threats now. I&#8217;ve had people telling me they hope my boat sinks. That&#8217;s like telling somebody that I hope their house burns down.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A boat displaying the anti-Biden slogan &#8220;Let&#8217;s Go Brandon&#8221; was disqualified from its first-place finish in a Virginia parade contest. A panel of judges for Yorktown, Virginia&#8217;s annual Christmas boat &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":177,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1102701","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1102701","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/177"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1102701"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1102701\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1102701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1102701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1102701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}