U.S. Olympic speed skater Shani Davis is not happy with the Olympics and threw shade at the Pyeongchang opening ceremony for not being included as flag bearer.
Davis became the first African-American athlete to win an individual Winter Olympics gold medal in 2006. In the Pyeongchang 2018 Olympic Games, Davis was in contention to carry the American flag but lost in a coin toss to Erin Hamlin, a move he said he felt was dishonorable.
The role of flag bearer is typically chosen in a vote by eight U.S. winter sports federations, CNN reports. Davis and Hamlin tied 4-4, thus the reason for the coin toss. However, Davis took to his Twitter account, which is set to private, and tweeted the following in regards to the outcome of the coin toss, according to the New York Daily News:
"I am an American and when I won the 1000m in 2010 I became the first American to 2-peat in that event. @TeamUSA dishonorably tossed a coin to decide its 2018 flag bearer. No problem. I can wait until 2022."
Davis added hashtag #BlackHistoryMonth18 to the end of his tweet, implying that racial bias was involved.
A U.S speed skating spokesperson told Reuters that Davis had originally planned to skip the march in the parade of nations but would have made an exception if he had been chosen to be the flag bearer.
"[Davis] is fully focused on his first race and is concentrating on that,” the spokesperson said.
Even the Rev. Jesse Jackson weighed in on this snub online:
The choice to represent our country as #flagbearer in the @Olympics should never be determined by the flip of a coin. The Committee should immediately institute a more appropriate system to make such a significant determination. @ShaniDavis
pic.twitter.com/OmR7C9o1GM— Rev Jesse Jackson Sr (@RevJJackson) February 9, 2018