Allen says his offensive tweets were supposed to be removed

Josh Allen apologized Thursday for his racially insensitive tweets that resurfaced the night prior, and added that he previously went through his Twitter history to try to take down offensive material.

"I had even typed in keywords to see if anything I had tweeted popped up that I needed to clean up, but nothing like these came up or I just missed them," the quarterback prospect told Chris Mortensen of ESPN. "My agency went over any past social media, and these didn't come up after I did the search."

A number of tweets Allen posted in high school from 2012-13 containing the "N-word" went viral late Wednesday, the eve of the 2018 NFL Draft. Allen is thought to be a candidate to be selected first overall, though the Cleveland Browns are reportedly more enamored with Oklahoma's Baker Mayfield.

"If I could go back in time, I would never have done this in a heartbeat," Allen said of the tweets. "At the time, I obviously didn't know how harmful it was and now has become. I hope you know and others know I'm not the type of person I was at 14 and 15 that I tweeted so recklessly. ... I don't want that to be the impression of who I am, because that is not me. I apologize for what I did."

Allen first apologized for the posts when contacted Wednesday by Stephen A. Smith of ESPN. He acknowledged that the tweets - which are now deleted - were authentic and posted by him.

"It sucks," Allen said hours before the draft. "My family is hurting. We never envisioned a day or night like this."

Allen is still expected to hear his name called early in the first round, but it's possible the insensitive material could have a last-minute impact on his stock. The Wyoming product said no NFL teams have reached out to him regarding the tweets, but that he'll prove his character to whichever franchise drafts him.

"I will set the record straight for any team, any teammate, the media, and I think once they meet me and they're around me, see how I act and how I think, that it's not going to be a problem at all," Allen said.