A teenager who went viral after appearing to confront a Native American man has said he was trying to calm tensions rather than increase them.

Nick Sandmann was criticised after being filmed face to face with Nathan Phillips, an activist and Vietnam War veteran who was singing and playing a drum as he participated in an indigenous people's march.

The teenager was wearing a Make America Great Again hat at the time - popularised during Donald Trump's presidential campaign - and he was seen smiling and staring at Mr Phillips as other young men appeared to mock him.

In a statement, Mr Sandmann insisted that the video had been misinterpreted, and said this had led to "outright lies being spread about my family and me".

He said his group was waiting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC when four African-American protesters nearby began shouting racially charged insults.


With permission from their teacher chaperones, the students responded by shouting "school spirit" chants to "drown out the hateful comments" directed at them.

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Mr Sandmann denied acting disrespectfully - and said Mr Phillips had approached him after wading into the crowd.

The student wrote: "He locked eyes with me and approached me, coming within inches of my face. He played his drum the entire time he was in my face.

"I never interacted with this protester. I did not speak to him. I did not make any hand gestures or other aggressive moves."

Mr Sandmann added that he was "startled and confused" as to why the activist had approached him - and claimed he had remained "motionless and calm" in an attempt to defuse the situation.

The teenager and his classmates, who study at a private, all-male Catholic high school in Kentucky, were in Washington DC to attend an anti-abortion rally.

After footage of the incident emerged, the high school promised to launch an investigation and condemned the students' actions.

But speaking to The New York Times, Mr Phillips acknowledged that he had approached the crowd of students in a bid to ease racial tensions that had flared between the white teenagers and the African-American protesters.

He told the newspaper: "I stepped in between to pray."

A longer video of the confrontation appears to back up Mr Sandmann's version of events.

The footage shows a group, who identify as members of the Hebrew Israelites, shouting racist slurs at participants of the Indigenous People's Rally and the schoolchildren prior to Mr Phillips' arrival.