Why the National Association of Black Journalists 'Personally Attacked' Stephen A. Smith, Explained
It's impossible to understand why the ESPN personality won NABJ's Thumbs Down Award without knowing the history, the mission and the series of events that preceded the decision.
On Saturday Night, the National Association of Black Journalists bestowed its annual Thumbs Down Award to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr, CBS News, Circle City Broadcasting/WISH-TV CEO DuJuan McCoy, the Washington Post and this guy:
“Smith has established a recurring public pattern of disparaging commentary directed at prominent Black women across politics, sports and media,” the NABJ explained in a video presentation of the award. “Such commentary reinforces harmful narratives, undermines the fair and respectful representation of Black women in public discourse and stands in direct conflict with NABJ’s long-standing commitment to accurate, responsible and inclusive portrayals of Black communities.”
While the announcement sparked heated online discourse among uninformed experts who feed the social media outrage algorithm, the decision wasn’t really controversial. As someone who had a front-row seat to the announcement and spent hours talking to attendees afterward, the Thumbs Down Award and Smith weren’t a big topic of conversation. Smith, however, was incensed and vowed to respond to the slight.
On Monday, he kept his promise. During a nearly hour-long rant on his YouTube channel, the First Take host called the award a “personal hit job” that “crossed the line.”
Before I go any further, there are a few things you should know about what you are about to read:
ContrabandCamp was founded by dues-paying, voting members of the National Association of Black Journalists. Our staff attended this year’s NABJ conference and participated in the official events. Our contributors hold leadership positions in the organization, vote in NABJ elections and support the organization in various ways. And shortly before NABJ announced the 2026 recipients of the now-famous Thumbs Down Award, ContrabandCamp received the NABJ Award for best digital commentary.
Some would argue that our ability to discuss this so-called “controversy” without bias is compromised by our relationship with NABJ.
I agree.
I am biased. That’s how journalism works. Having more information and additional context allows news gatherers to deliver a more informed perspective to the public than random reactionaries who speculate about tweets, online clips and out-of-context headlines. It’s why political reporters ride on Air Force One, and sportswriters wait in locker rooms. Attending the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner doesn’t prevent a professional journalist from speaking truth to power any more than interviewing an actress prevents movie critics from honestly reviewing a movie. Whether you’re a political pundit or a medical doctor, your professional opinion is supposed to be biased by facts, information and experience.
And, while I am a longtime NABJ supporter, there is someone who has paid more dues, attended more conventions and given more financial support to the National Association of Black Journalists than ContrabandCamp’s entire staff combined.
This guy:
Not only is Stephen A. Smith a regular NABJ convention attendee, but he has aired his popular ESPN show from the yearly convention, and the network that employs him has also sponsored events. I personally know sports journalists who credit him with getting hired by the “worldwide leader” and have witnessed convention goers clamoring to meet one of the most prominent sports journalists in the world.
Still, while the Thumbs Down Award is part of a longstanding NABJ tradition, it has nothing to do with a recipient’s political affiliation, prominence or credentials as a Black person.
What is the NABJ Thumbs Down Award?
According to the NABJ website, the award “calls attention to an individual or organization for especially insensitive, racist or stereotypical reporting, commentary, photography, or cartoons about the Black community or for engaging in practices at odds with the goals of the National Association of Black Journalists.”
Previous recipients include NFL Media, Fox News (twice) and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. To be clear, the award is not exclusive to white recipients. In fact, the association has given the Thumbs Down Award to NABJ award-winning outlets like the Cleveland Plain Dealer and Ebony Magazine.
So why did the NABJ call out Stephen A. Smith?
Again, my opinion on the inauspicious honor doesn’t matter any more than Stephen A. Smith’s accusation of it being a “personal attack.”
Why Stephen A. Smith?
If you only consider his "insensitive commentary,” his “stereotypical reporting,” his attacks on Black journalists, his comments on “the Black community” and whether Stephen A. Smith engages “in practices at odds with the goals of the National Association of Black Journalists," he has:
Said Donald Trump’s criminal activities make him “relatable” to Black voters
Chastised social media users for pointing out Charlie Kirk’s racism
Contradicted journalists who called Donald Trump “racist”
Allowed a guest to say that Nolan Wells' parents "don't care about him drowning"
Platformed white-male grievance influencer Ben Shapiro
Feuded with Jemele Hill
and Joy Reid
and Jasmine Crockett
and Monica McNutt
and Cari Champion
and Sunny Hostin
and Serena Williams
and Michelle Obama
and Kamala Harris
and Bakari Sellers
and Black men (including Trayvon Martin) who wear hoodies
and victims of domestic abuse who “provoke” their abusers
and Black Democrats
and Black reporters who don’t stay in their “lane”
And yes, he pays dues.
Why was this even necessary?
Here is where context matters.
While the National Association of Black Journalists was originally founded to “monitor and sensitize all media to racism,” over the years, the phrase was removed from the constitution.
In 2025, the NABJ underwent a shakeup after numerous members, including myself, called out the organization for inviting Donald Trump to its annual convention. While many outlets framed the controversy as a political disagreement, NABJ members condemned the executive leaders for failing to uphold the group’s constitutional duty to protect Black journalists.
How?
Well, April Ryan, Yamiche Alcindor, Abby Phillip, Ebony McMorris, Jemele Hill and Joy Reid are not just Black journalists who have been targeted by the president of the United States…
They are also current and former members of the National Association of Black Journalists.
So after NABJ subjected its members to the most powerful racist in the world, the membership voted to reinsert the original mission statement in the organization’s constitution. After ousting most of the leaders responsible for the Trump fiasco, they elected longtime journalist Errin Haines as president. While you should know that I was sitting at Haines’ table when the Thumbs Down Award was announced, I don’t have to explain why she thought it was necessary to put Smith on the NABJ’s Summer Jam screen, because she did it herself.
“You heard the names tonight, but I want to talk about why we name them,” Haines explained. “I know the Thumbs Down Award can make people uncomfortable. Good. Because accountability is not supposed to be comfortable…If NABJ is going to be serious about defending Black journalists and defending journalism itself, then sometimes we have to say their names. So tonight we did.”
Haines continued:
To the journalists who do the work inside the institutions that we name tonight, I need y’all to hear me clearly: This is not an indictment of you. It’s quite the opposite…
The purpose of the Thumbs Down Award cannot be to simply embarrass somebody for one night. That’s not enough for this moment. Accountability has to lead somewhere…The goal is not permanent condemnation. The goal is progress. But progress does not happen without pressure…Sometimes somebody has to stand on a stage in a ballroom full of powerful people —sometimes, with some of those people sitting right in front of you—and say, ‘This is not good enough.’
That is not disrespect. That is leadership. That is accountability. And in this moment, that is part of NABJ’s responsibility. Tonight, we have celebrated excellence, but celebrating excellence also requires us to identify what threatens it. We are here to protect Black journalists.
Of course, there are still people who don’t believe the actual words coming out of the NABJ president’s mouth. They will never be convinced that Smith’s affinity for conservatism and anti-Black politics is not what caused NABJ to put Smith on blast. But those people don’t care what scores of Black women have been saying for years. They don’t care that this year’s NABJ Journalist of the Year, Beatrice Peterson, actually covered Republicans, Black conservatives and even Charlie Kirk in a positive light. They will never acknowledge that Harris Faulkner was representing two-time Thumbs Down recipient Fox News when she interviewed Trump at the NABJ conference.
More importantly, they don’t understand what happened in 2025.
During a year when the entire landscape of mainstream media was whitewashing news, firing Black journalists and normalizing a white supremacist presidential candidate, NABJ’s previous leaders somehow decided that there wasn’t a single institution or individual in American media that deserved the Thumbs Down Award.
Those same people don’t wonder why Stephen A. Smith doesn’t have the same smoke for his white homeboys like Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly. They are willing to ignore the fact that NABJ called out Smith in the same way that he has called out Jasmine Crockett, Joy Reid and numerous other Black women. They won’t mention that Black people might just be Smith’s footstool for his stated goal of becoming the Black Joe Rogan.
And when Smith responded to NABJ’s objectively true criticism by calling himself “one of the top dudes” in the history of Black journalism, he may have forgotten about his fellow female NABJ members who have won more Pulitzer Prizes, earned more NABJ awards, have bigger audiences and have more respect than he could earn in seven lifetimes.
In all fairness, it’s possible that Black women, Black men, Black experts, Black organizations, Black comedians, Black politicians, battered women, the parents of dead Black boys and the best and brightest Black journalists on the entire planet are not as smart, enlightened or informed as Stephen A. Smith and his white nationalist, anti-Black circle of sycophants.
But here’s the ultimate question.
Imagine you were elected to protect a group of people. What if you gained your position by just promising to do your job? Imagine that one of your members was engaged in the same practice as the man whose actions had caused the biggest shakeup in the history of your organization. But instead of kicking them out of your organization or “canceling them,” you used the only tool you had to hold individuals and institutions accountable. What if you spared the person’s reputation and explained your actions for the world to hear?
What would you do?
Well, here’s what NABJ did to Stephen A. Smith:
👎🏾
Now you’re ready for Stephen A. Smith to explain why “Enough is enough.”
Congrats to Contraband Camp for the award. Well deserved.
Everything that needs to be said about Stephen A, you said it better than I ever could. I don’t watch anything he does. And I’m sure he screamed for an hour. So what. He deserves the thumbs down.
In short: because he's a coon.