Hurricane Response Worker Removed After Flashing ‘Offensive’ Sign on TV

The U.S. Coast Guard has removed a hurricane response worker from the Florence team after he flashed a known white power hand sign on live TV.

The response worker went viral after he appeared in the background of MSNBC’s coverage of the storm. As one person spoke directly to the camera, a man at a computer pointedly held his hand up behind his head. Without looking, he touched his forefinger to his thumb in a circle and extended his other three fingers in what used to be a gesture meaning “okay.” These days, however, it is an increasingly recognizable symbol of the alt right.

The Anti-Defamation League has officially categorized the hand sign as a gesture meant to incite confusion and fury. They link the symbol to a hoax campaign originating on 4chan. The massive trolling effort began last February, and was known as “Operation O-KKK.”

“We must flood Twitter and other social media websites… claiming that the OK hand sign is a symbol of white supremacy,” one anonymous user proclaimed. “Leftists have dug so deep down into their lunacy. We must force [them] to dig more, until the rest of society ain’t going anywhere near that s—.”

However it began, the Anti-Defamation League acknowledges that the sign has since been “used by people across several segments of the right and far right — including some actual white supremacists — who generally use it to trigger reactions, or what they would describe as ‘trolling the libs.’”

The symbol has already caused a number of widespread controversies, with alt-right leaders or even government officials flashing it and then later claiming that they did not understand the implication. At the beginning of Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearing, his former law clerk Zina Bash sat behind him, holding her hand in the gesture and staring directly at the camera.

She was later defended by many pundits who claimed that she could not be promoting “white power,” since she herself was born in Mexico to a Mexican mother and Jewish father. However, Bash kept the controversy raging when she flashed the symbol even more prominently later on in the hearing.

The hand sign even cropped up in a Kanye West tweet during his controversial return to social media back in April. In a now-deleted selfie, he wore a “Make America Great Again” hat while standing beside an older man making the gesture.

The Coast Guard announced the removal of the member who used the hand sign on Friday, though they did not specify any further action.

“We are aware of the offensive video on Twitter – the Coast Guard has identified the member and removed him from the response,” the military branch tweeted. “His actions do not reflect those of the United States Coast Guard.”