South Carolina Lawmaker Admits Positive Response To Racist Email

Posted by | August 29, 2012 12:36 | Filed under: Top Stories


SC State Rep. Alan Clemmons admits he responded in a positive manner to a racist email supporting Clemmons’s effort to enact a voter ID law. This comes during a trial in a case initiated by civil rights groups.

Garrard Beeney, who represented the civil rights groups, presented emails sent to and from Clemmons’ personal account between 2009 and 2011, when he was working on the law. One, from a man named Ed Koziol, used racially charged rhetoric to denounce the idea that poor, black voters might lack transportation or other resources necessary to obtain photo ID. If the legislature offered a reward for identification cards, “it would be like a swarm of bees going after a watermelon,” Koziol wrote.

Beeney asked Clemmons how he had replied to this email. Clemmons hesitated a moment before answering, “It was a poorly considered response when I said, ‘Amen, Ed, thank you for your support.’”

Beeney also contended that Clemmons, a Republican, wrote the law to suppress Democratic votes. Blacks in South Carolina typically vote Democratic. Beeney asked Clemmons whether he remembered distributing packets of peanuts with cards that read “Stop Obama’s nutty agenda and support voter ID.”

Clemmons said he did not, though Beeney said he had testified in June that he did.

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Copyright 2012 Liberaland
By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.

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