Florida man running for local office 'told teen Puerto Rican tennis players to "go and cut grass"'
A Florida local politician is under fire after he was accused of being racist to Puerto Rican tennis players by telling them to 'go and cut grass'.
Martin Hyde, a Sarasota City Commission candidate and business man in the area, berated the Hispanic teenagers at the Bath & Racquet Club on Tuesday.
The 15-year-old Puerto Rican junior tennis player and his friend were at the club for a youth tournament, according to the Sarasota Herald Tribune.
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The teen took video footage of the moment Hyde exploded on him at the club.
'That’s racism, man, how can you say something like that? Aren’t you human?' the teen says to Hyde at the start of the video.
'This is a private club, get out,' Hyde responds.
Hyde then says 'I'm going to have a little talk with him.'
'I'm getting out! No you're rude! You're telling me to cut grass because I'm Hispanic,' the teen says in the clip as Hyde tries to talk to a club worker.
'Yes. So what?' Hyde asks.
'Are you processing this?' the teen says outraged.
Hyde then approaches another club worker and says 'Just throw 'em out', motioning towards the Puerto Rican teen and his friend.
'We're here for an international tournament,' the teen responds.
'Listen to them. Look at this agitated... You don't know what drugs they're on,' Hyde said.
When the teen then tries to explain to Hyde and a club worker what went down, Hyde waves his hand in the teen's face and loftily says 'Shut up'.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7752621/White-Florida-man-running-local-office-told-Puerto-Rican-tennis-players-cut-grass.html
I acknowledge from the get-go is that I was wrong and that much wasn’t based on their ethnicity. It was based on my poor character,' he said in an interview with ABC.
He claimed that the teens were talking loudly and disrupting a lesson his son was taking.
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