A Trump supporter is suing the New York Mets and Citi Field for $2 million after claiming she was barred from entering the stadium last month unless she took off her “Make America Great Again” hat.
Aura Moody, 64, filed the lawsuit in Brooklyn federal court on September 6. The Queens native told the New York Post that the ban clearly violates her right to free speech and caused her emotional distress. “This country is supposed to be the beacon of freedom for all,” she told the outlet.
Moody, who is representing herself, is further accusing the organization of “racial discrimination and political retaliation” and “reputational harm.”
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🔥🚨BREAKING: A Black woman is suing the New York Nets for $2 Million after she was told to remove her Trump MAGA hat before entering the stadium. I was wondering why the media has been silent on this but now I see why. pic.twitter.com/WhHhrXLvFY
— Dom Lucre | Breaker of Narratives (@dom_lucre) September 21, 2024
The incident occurred when Moody, a social worker and mother of two, bought tickets for a Mets home game against the Oakland Athletics on August 14.
Both Moody and a friend were wearing MAGA hats when they arrived at Citi Field. They had travelled with a group of eight additional members of the Queens Village Republican Club.
Just as the group had made their way past security, they were stopped by a Citi Field staffer who told them they would not be allowed inside the stadium unless the hats were removed. Moody told the New York Post that she asserted her First Amendment rights at multiple points throughout the encounter, though she was ultimately told the hat was “too political” and needed to be removed.
Moody and her friend ultimately removed their hats, but only so that other members of their group would not be inconvenienced.
Moody “attempted to de-escalate the situation” and asked if she could put her MAGA hat in her bag, but was told, “No because you can put the hat back on when you get to your seat. You have to take the MAGA hat out of the Stadium,” the New York Post reported.
Moody “knew she was being racially targeted and politically retaliated against for being a Black woman wearing a MAGA hat, so she requested to speak to a supervisor,” she said in the legal filing.
The suit does acknowledge that a team representative called Moody on August 17 and “apologized on behalf of the New York Mets,” and assured her that “there is no such policy against wearing a MAGA hat, and the Staff has been retrained.”
The Mets have not yet commented on the lawsuit.
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