A Manatee County man running for office is showing his support of the Tampa Bay Lightning days after a PR campaign went terribly wrong.
- Bradenton mayoral candidate gets Lightning tattoo live on Tampa Bay's 102.5
- Warren Merriman says he "bleeds blue"
- Stunt comes days after #BoycottBradenton hashtag started trending
Warren Merriman is running for Mayor of Bradenton.
Wednesday morning, he went on the Mike Calta show, on Tampa Bay’s 102.5 “The Bone”, and got a Lightning tattoo live on the air. Merriman said he did it in an effort to bring back visitors to Bradenton.
“I'm speaking about it to bring light to the fact that it’s not all of Bradenton,” said Merriman. “I got my first tattoo to show my support for the Tampa Bay Lightning and Tampa Bay professional teams and I want you to come to Bradenton when I’m mayor. I bleed blue.”
Last weekend, the Pittsburgh Penguins handed out 20,000 towels to fans sponsored by the Bradenton Convention and Visitors Bureau. The towels said “Let’s Go Pens!”
It caused a national backlash with people saying they would "boycott" Bradenton via the trending hashtag #BoycottBradenton. The Bradenton Area Convention and Visitors Bureau has since apologized.
On the group's Facebook page, a statement reads: