NASCAR investigating radio hack, racist comments towards Bubba Wallace

At the end of exhibition at North Wilkensboro Speedway in North Carolina, someone used racist language towards Wallace. The first intruding voice said "Go back to where you came from you a******." Seconds later, another voice said "Suck it, you’re not wanted in NASCAR."

Wallace, who was born in Alabama and raised in North Carolina, is the only Black driver in the Cup Series circuit.

A Twitter user named Jeff posted the NSFW audio, tagging several members of the media:

It was an eventful weekend for Wallace, starting with a fifth-place showing in the Truck Series battle on Saturday. Upon being jeered by fans during the truck race, NASCAR beat reporter Noah Lewis asked if there's something those detractors should know about him and if the boos affect him, Wallace said "as long as you continue to live your life judging a book by its cover, that's who you are. Don't change it up for anybody else."

For Sunday's $1 million exhibition, Wallace was greeted with a chorus of boos during racer introductions, prompting this comical response from the 23XI Racing driver:

In his post-race interview on FOX, however, Wallace is shown quickly flipping off someone unseen on camera before speaking with Jamie Little:

To the surprise of no one, some fans online (and likely in person) have tried to use his mocking "boo-hoo" and his one-finger salute to justify the radio hack. It's another chapter in the sordid story of bigoted hate towards Wallace, who became a full-time Cup Series driver with Richard Petty's team in 2018 before moving onto Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin's 23XI in 2021.

 
In 2020, Wallace, who had been vocal about race and his identity in motorsports, voiced support for the Black Lives Matter movement and called for NASCAR to ban the Confederate flag, a Civil War-era symbol of "the Lost Cause" that's rooted in racism, from all of its tracks. Not long after that, an investigation into a rope that was mistaken for a noose those who disliked his presence in NASCAR to call him fake and that the ordeal was a hoax for attention.

If those detractors haven't figured it out by now, Wallace has clearly proven that he's belonged in NASCAR for quite some time. A two-time Daytona 500 runner-up with two race wins under his belt since becoming a full-time driver in 2018, Wallace has three top-five finishes and four top-ten finishes in 13 Cup Series races so far in 2023