Luke Combs apologized for his past use of the confederate flag during Country Radio Seminar.
His Past Use of the Confederate Flag
The “Forever After All” singer performed in front of a confederate flag in the “Can I Get An Outlaw” music video for Ryan Upchurch. The 2015 video also showed a sticker of the flag on Combs‘ guitar.
Screenshots from the video appeared on social media of him with the flag earlier this month. The photos began circulating after he released a song he co-wrote called “The Great Divide,” which some people originally thought was a political song. Combs intended for the song to be part of a Bluegrass album. However, he released it as a duet with Billy Strings.
Fellow country singer Margo Price called out Combs for his past use of the flag.
What Luke Combs Had to Say
Combs spoke with Maren Morris during a panel at Country Radio Seminar on February 17. The two candidly discussed their own personal moments of accountability.
“There is no excuse for those images,” Combs shared.“I’m not trying to say ‘This why they were there and it’s okay that they’re there because it’s not okay. I think as a younger man that was an image that I associated to mean something else.”
“As I’ve grown in my time as an artist, and as the world has changed drastically in the last five to seven years, I am now aware how painful that image can be to someone else,” Combs confessed. “I would never want to be associated with something that brings so much hurt to someone else.”
Combs then apologized twice and hopes to learn and be better. “I do apologize for that,” he continued. “I do apologize for being associated with that. Hate is not apart of my core values.”
