Tampa – Tampa Tribune columnist Douglas MacKinnon has left his job at the newspaper. The Tampa Tribune’s publisher Brian Burns confirmed Oct. 28 that MacKinnon is leaving the paper but would not disclose the reason
MacKinnon, who was also a former aide to Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, wrote a column Aug. 11 suggesting Disney had a “gay agenda” toward “impressionable children” by exposing them to “openly gay characters and couples.” The column was widely criticized, including a viewpoint column written by Jamie Hyman, Watermark’s Director of Online Media.
MacKinnon also recently published “The Secessionist States of America: The Blueprint for Creating a Traditional Values Country…Now,” which cited the progress of LGBT rights as one of the major reasons the South should secede from the rest of the U.S. to form a new country based on “traditional values.”
Creative Loafing in Tampa reported Oct. 27 that MacKinnon was fired due to him being an “embarrassment to the paper,” but did not name their sources.
The controversial Aug. 11 column was pulled from the Tampa Tribune’s website three days after publication.
Douglas MacKinnon image via CNN.
