New York Magazine Accused of Cropping Out Black People at Trump Celebration

New York magazine is under fire from some quarters for cropping out Black people from the photograph of a cover story about young President Trump supporters.

The picture, taken by Mark Peterson, shows a sea of people at the Power 30 Awards in Washington D.C., a party put on for social media influencers who had helped Trump get reelected. The event was sponsored by TikTok.

The article is headlined “The Cruel Kids’ Table” and has the subheading “Out late with the young right as they contemplate cultural domination.” The author is Brock Colyar.

The cover photo shows exclusively caucasian faces but a wider crop shows the evening’s Black co-host, CJ Pearson. The full image does appear inside the article and online which shows Pearson and two other Black attendees.

Critics jumped on New York magazine after highlighting Coylar’s words in which they say: “Almost everyone is white,” when describing the new, young Trump supporters attending the festivities. “The men look like Pete Hegseth, in bow ties and black suits, with clean-shaven faces. The women are almost all out of their league.”

Later on in the article, Coylar writes that a woman asked them if they had noticed that “the entire room is white?”

The Hollywood Reporter notes that conservative commentator Christopher Barnard brought attention to the magazine cover on X, to which the host of the night, Pearson, replied: “This is insane.”

“I hosted this event and New York mag intentionally left me out of their story because it would have undermined their narrative that MAGA is some racist cult. They also didn’t include the fact that Waka Flocka Flame and Gervona Davis were also there,” Pearson writes highlighting two other Black guests.

The New York article does note that Waka Flocka Flame, a rapper, performed at the event but didn’t mention his ethnicity. Pearson then shared a series of photos from the event showing Black attendees.

“They were wrong to crop the photo and insinuate that I was throwing some KKK kumbaya,” Pearson tells the New York Post. He adds that the cropping out of non-white guests was intentional.

In a statement, New York magazine, which is owned by Vox Media, defended the cover image.

“The magazine’s most recent cover story explores the new class of conservatives taking Washington by storm, through the lens of inauguration weekend,” the statement reads. “The cover was cropped to the center of a picture that was published in full online, and we believe both the cover and story provide an accurate impression of the weekend.”

Another New York magazine front cover sparked controversy last summer: one that depicted a half-naked image of what was then the two presidential candidates — Donald Trump and Joe Biden. Many called the cover “disturbing.”

Image credits: Photographs by New York Magazine/Mark Peterson.