As grim spectre of the first presidential debate looms faintly in the distance, we are blessed with the insight of people like Kathy Miller, Ohio Trump campaign chair who said Thursday that before Obama, there was no racism.
Miller’s comments kicked off an eight-part video series called “Anywhere but Washington” in which The Guardian takes a closer look at “America’s most overlooked peoples and places reveal about a nation divided.” MIller’s comments are blatantly ridiculous and horrifically racist, but they’re a nice reminder that every single person should get to the fucking polls and vote.
“If you’re black and you haven’t been successful in the last 50 years, it’s your own fault. You’ve had every opportunity, it was given to you,” she said.
“You’ve had the same schools everybody else went to. You had benefits to go to college that white kids didn’t have. You had all the advantages and didn’t take advantage of it. It’s not our fault, certainly.”
Miller lives in Mahoning County, a historically Democratic stronghold that includes Youngstown, a city formerly flush with steel money that’s now in the throes of a slow, creeping economic decline. Trump’s various promises to re-negotiate international trade deals and bring manufacturing back to the United States resonate particularly well with the working-class Democrats out of jobs who feel disenfranchised by the government and are seeking a leader who, despite having zero experience and little understanding of how government or the economy works, will bring prosperity and jobs back to their community. According to the Guardian, before the primaries, some 6,000 registered Democrats switched to Republican so that they could vote for Trump. Great.
Mark Munroe, the Mahoning chair for the GOP called her statements “insane” and immediately requested that she be dismissed from her position. Hours after her extremely controversial statements, she resigned from her post and gave up her position as official Ohio elector to the electoral college for Trump’s campaign.
“My personal comments were inappropriate, and I apologize. I am not a spokesperson for the campaign and was not speaking on its behalf,” she said in apology. “I have resigned as the volunteer campaign chair in Mahoning County and as an elector to the electoral college to avoid any unnecessary distractions.”
Editors note: Updated to remove accidental and honestly unintentional coastal elitism. Everyone should vote. Please. Thank you.