Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., appeared to take a victory lap over The New York Times as it reported on Democratic New York Gov. Kathy Hochul's plans to send troops to the Big Apple to crack down on crime.
Hochul announced Wednesday that she will be deploying 750 members of the National Guard to New York City's subway system to assist the New York Police Department (NYPD) with bag searches at the entrances of busy train stations.
This comes as the crime rate increased 20% during the first two months of 2024 compared to the same period last year, according to NYPD data cited by the New York Post.
The Times shared the "breaking news" on social media, which caught Cotton's attention.
NEW YORK GOV HOCHUL CALLS IN NATIONAL GUARD, STATE POLICE TO HELP CURB CRIME IN NYC SUBWAYS
"Sending in the troops to help restore law and order..." Cotton summarized the Times' reporting.
Cotton was overtly referring to his 2020 op-ed published by The Times, titled "Send in the Troops," which made an argument in favor of the president deploying the military to quell the George Floyd riots that sparked havoc in cities across the country. Publication of the op-ed caused turmoil among woke staff at the paper, with several editors being pushed out.
Several other social media users took swipes at the Gray Lady over how Cotton's past suggestion is now being implemented by Hochul.
"Remember when the NY Times fired its opinion editor for running a piece suggesting pretty much this?" Daily Telegraph editor James Morrow asked.
"Tom Cotton proposed deploying the National Guard to quell some of the most destructive riots in American history. Hochul is doing it for quotidian law enforcement purposes," Washington Free Beacon reporter Aaron Sibarium wrote. "Crickets from New York Times staffers."
THE NEW YORK TIMES REMAINS HAUNTED BY THE TOM COTTON OP-ED ALMOST 4 YEARS LATER
"I was reliably told by the @nytimes in the summer of 2020 that this was racism. The head of the NYT editorial page was even fired for publishing an opinion piece arguing for this by Senator Tom Cotton. An honest newspaper would acknowledge this," OutKick founder Clay Travis said.
"How many @nytimes employees will be killed as a result?" conservative radio host Erick Erickson quipped, referring to the claim that Black Times staffers were put in danger by Cotton's op-ed.
The Times did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital.
It has been nearly four years since Cotton's op-ed was published and to this day people are still talking about it – not regarding what was actually written by the Republican senator, but rather the newsroom drama that stemmed from it.
After the op-ed was published on June 3, 2020, dozens of Times employees rushed to social media in a coordinated campaign, many of them echoing the phrase "Running this put Black @nytimes staff in danger."
Days later, The Times updated Cotton's piece with a lengthy editor's note declaring that it "fell short of our standards and should not have been published."
Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger, who initially defended the op-ed's publication, later reversed himself, blaming "a rushed editorial process." Two members of the Times Opinion staff, James Bennet and Adam Rubenstein, were pushed out at the Times as a result. Another staffer, James Dao, was reassigned to a different department.
Former Times writer and opinion editor Bari Weiss resigned a month later, in part because of the op-ed fiasco, citing a bullying and illiberal environment at the paper.
The op-ed debacle has repeatedly resurfaced in the public square in recent years. Most recently, Rubenstein penned a tell-all about the liberal bias in The Times newsroom.
Perhaps the most explosive anecdote from his exposé was how he was shamed by an HR representative during his orientation for saying Chick-fil-A served his favorite sandwich for an icebreaker.
"We don’t do that here. They hate gay people," the HR rep scolded him before others "started snapping their fingers in acclamation."
Rubenstein's Chick-fil-A incident set X ablaze with liberal detractors like his former Times colleague Nikole Hannah-Jones accusing him of making up the story, which had repeatedly been verified by other journalists and Rubenstein's acquaintances aware of the orientation snafu.
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