Black man who says he was elected mayor of Alabama town alleges that White leaders are keeping him from position
A Black man who says he was elected mayor of a rural Alabama town but has been kept from taking office by White leaders of the town has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/patrick-braxton-black-man-says-he-was-elected-mayor-of-newburn-alabama/Open linkView original on lemmy.world565
Comments40
Inheriting political positions is literally anti-American. We fought a war over this. Fucking Alabama.
They did have a proper election. There was only one candidate, so he won. Then they had a second, improper election where only the previous council was allowed to qualify for office or vote.
Yes, I'm sure they haven't held an election in 165 years because the 85% black population all agreed it would just be a waste of time. Are you serous?
There actually was a regular election- the incumbents just declined to run a candidate against Braxton. Are you suggesting we should cast doubt on that result until the incumbents agree to qualify a candidate (so, never)?
I'm suggesting that what happened with this election may have happened in the past.
you wrote:
Does it? It actually sounds like a white minority council bends over backwards to keep themselves in power by ignoring opposition and holding private special elections.
Don't confuse oppression with apathy.
They will not let them hold elections. Read the article before you "innocently assume" these people "don't seem to really care".
I think the whole reason that they didn't field a candidate against Braxton is precisely to get people casting doubt on the a validity of "won by default".
There is a process to hold office, everyone has a pretty good idea of what that means. They can't plead ignorance.
There are a large number of local elections decided because only one person applied for the job and they don't have any issues like this.
Sounds fucky
Small towns suck. Big towns suck. Cities suck. America sucks and it's not coming back.
I'm still waiting for all the America haters to move to Holland.
The only people capable of fundamentally improving one's country are those willing to see what's wrong with it. The very country of the United States was founded by a bunch of people so mad about their country that they literally revolted.
If this happened in 2021 and 2022 why wait till now to file a federal lawsuit?
No one would take his case.
Not just that, the first lawyers he approached scammed him I think.
America needs free and reformed education and more psychedelics.
Do you see either of those happening anytime soon?
It's a shame, aside from all the racism, Newbern actually seems like a lovely little southern small town.
To clarify, this came in response to looking up Newbern on Google maps and seeing the only photo attached to the town is a group of smiling black women celebrating the 4th of July. If that's the representation of the town, it seems like a nice place.
I probably should have said more specifically 'aside from the racist white minority leadership it seems like it could be a really nice place.' Nice places can have shit leaders. Was happy to see the town hall already has some one star reviews in response to this story. Hopefully more attention will help them toss the bigots to the curb.
I dunno, man. The racism sounds like it’s one of the towns primary characteristics.
Yeah lol. You can’t really “aside from the racism” when that’s their primary focus.
Pretty sure the more than %70 black/African American town population might disagree with you. Seems pretty unkind and disingenuous to paint a whole town as a shithole because some assholes are in charge.
"Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?"
There's 130 people that live in that town. No one there really gives a flying
The real story is they don't even have a mayoral position, so a nothing story ginned to stoke hatred toward white people.
They do have a mayor position, they just didn't care for it until someone decided to run for it.
Hating racists isn't the same as hating white people.
Disagreeing with those specific people for their actions is not the same as hatred for white people. An asshole is an asshole whether they're black, white or green.