Former NBC executive sparks backlash for saying 18-year-old Barron Trump is now 'fair game'
A former NBC honcho sparked intense backlash for suggesting former President Trump's youngest son was now "fair game" for turning 18 years old.
Mike Sington, a retired NBCUniversal senior executive who is better known for his pro-liberal social media posts, commemorated Barron Trump's birthday on Wednesday with a bizarre post on X.
"Barron Trump turns 18 today. He’s fair game now," Sington wrote, sharing an image of him with his father.
Critics unleashed on Sington for targeting Barron, who has largely stayed out of the limelight during and after the Trump presidency.
Sington deleted the post and walked back the comment but stopped short of offering an apology.
"I posted he was 'fair game' now, meaning, as an adult, he's 'fair game' for criticism from the press," Sington told Newsweek in a statement. "Someone pointed out to me 'fair game' could mean fair game to be harmed. I don't wish physical harm on anyone, so I took it down. I listen to the comments and criticism I receive."
Neither Sington nor the Trump campaign immediately responded to Fox News Digital's requests for comment.
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This wasn't the first time Barron Trump was the target of his father's political adversaries. In 2019, Stanford Law Professor Pamela Karlan ignited a firestorm during impeachment hearings for cracking a joke at the expense of the then-13-year-old, saying during her testimony, "The Constitution says there can be no titles of nobility, so while the president can name his son Barron, he can’t make him a baron."
In 2018, actor Peter Fonda posted on Twitter he wanted to "rip Barron Trump from his mother's arms and put him in a cage with pedophiles."
In 2017, Katie Rich, then a writer for "Saturday Night Live" was suspended for saying on Twitter that Barron Trump "will be this country's first homeschool shooter."
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Additionally, "Jeopardy!" host Ken Jennings made a joke at the expense of Barron in response to a report of the then-11-year-old's reaction to Kathy Griffin's infamous photoshoot featuring a prop of the president's bloodied severed head, which Barron had thought was real.
"Barron Trump saw a very long necktie on a heap of expired deli meat in a dumpster. He thought it was his dad & his little heart is breaking," Ken Jennings wrote at the time.
Karlan, Ford, Rich and Jennings all issued apologies for their comments.