The MAGA Teens Aren't Innocent Victims

The viral video that seemed to show a white teenager in a MAGA hat harassing a Native American elder near the Lincoln Memorial turns out to have captured a more complicated conflict. The clip, which drew widespread condemnation over the holiday weekend, appeared to depict a then-unidentified teenager silently leering in the face of a Native American man who was beating a traditional drum. The teenager was surrounded by dozens of rowdy peers from the all-male Covington Catholic High School in Kentucky, who were in town to attend the anti-abortion March for Life; the man was participating in the annual Indigenous People's March the same day. In a post I wrote on Saturday, I described the boy's serene, smug facial expression as "both punchable and untouchable." In the days that followed, new accounts and new angles on the confrontation began to emerge.