UFC fighter defends husband's swastika tattoo after uproar: 'I'm not racist'

Erin Donnelly
·Yahoo Life Senior Editor

UFC star Andrea Lee has been caught up in a controversy over her husband’s tattoo of a swastika on his left arm.

As Fox News reports, a photo of Lee posing with her husband, Donny Aaron, revealed the Nazi ink near his left elbow crease, prompting outrage and accusations of anti-Semitism and racism.

According to another poster, Aaron also has SS bolts — another Nazi-era “hate symbol” identified by the Anti-Defamation League as a mark used by white supremacists — on his right arm, just below the elbow.

Mixed martial arts fans were quick to react to the offensive symbol.

Lee initially responded to the backlash by firing off an angry tweet explaining that Aaron’s swastika tattoo dates back to his time in prison. Court records show that Aaron was convicted of negligent homicide for the 2005 fatal shooting of an unarmed black man, Ronald Jamison.

Lee defended the ink and called her critics “sensitive ass mofos.” She has since deleted the tweet.

Aaron, meanwhile, tweeted that his tattoos “don’t define who I am” but claimed that getting them removed would make him look “even more redneck.”

Both Lee and Aaron have since issued longer statements, with Lee apologizing for causing offense with her first tweet about the controversy.

“The mistakes he made in his youth are not a representation of who he is today, which is a man that loves and respects everyone,” she said, adding that “the more I got to know him as a person, the less I noticed his skin.”

She went on to reiterate that neither she nor her husband have racist views.

Aaron’s statement regarding his “abhorrent tattoos” also dismissed accusations of racism, though he referenced the “sins” of his past. He again explained that tattoo removal was not “an option.”

The couple have also retweeted supportive messages saying Aaron shouldn’t be held accountable for his past.

But others continue to question Aaron’s judgment in letting the ink stay put.

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