Voter suppression is alive and well, especially in the state of North Carolina, where a Republican official, Don Yelton, proved himself to be at best intellectually limited, and at worse, downright crazy.
While discussing North Carolina’s new voter identification law, Yelton made some absurd and incendiary statements. “The law is going to kick the Democrats in the butt. If it hurts a bunch of college kids [that are] too lazy to get up off their bohonkas and go get a photo ID, so be it. If it hurts a bunch of Whites, so be it.”
Yelton continued, showing his racism, “If it hurts a bunch of lazy Blacks that want the government to give them everything, so be it,”
What is wrong with this man? Has he no decency? He tipped his hand by telling the world what he really thinks, and indicating what the so-called voter ID laws are really about. These laws are about suppressing likely Democratic votes. They are about racism and racist attitudes. These attitudes don’t belong in these United States of America, 150 years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation.
Who the heck is Don Yelton, anyway? He’s a local North Carolina precinct chair who initially answered questions about his interview with some belligerence.
“I’ve been called a bigot before,” he said before adding that his best friend is Black. Then he goes on to talk about the “n” word, saying that if African Americans can use the word, then so can he.
Of course, Yelton was reprimanded by his party. He ended up resigning over his comments. But no one reprimanded Mitt Romney over his 47 percent comments, and no one has reprimanded the many Republican racists who cling to the past, because they are frightened of our multicultural future.
I am waiting for someone to tell me that Yelton is “just one person” and that his views do not represent those of the Republican Party. I’m also waiting for ants to eat snakes! I am certain that Yelton has used these kinds of comments before. Is this the first time he has been reprimanded?
To apply the world “lazy” to students and African Americans is disingenuous, racist, and insulting. Yelton seemed careful, though, not to ignore senior citizens, some of who might be challenged to get new ID. Yelton’s comments are especially revealing of the contempt that some elected officials have for their constituents. Now that Republicans control both houses of the North Carolina legislature, they are free to say what they really think.
This is not a North Carolina problem. Lots of states want to suppress the vote with newer voter ID laws, fewer polling places, and other methods of keeping voters away from the polls. These efforts to “kick Democrats in the butt” by attacking likely Democratic voters ought to mobilize voters to out maneuver and out vote these people who are so crazy that they call others lazy.
The lazy comment is connected to racist stereotypes. Somebody needs to remind Mr. Yelton that the plantation and sharecropping systems that North Carolina’s economy rested on for at least a century was staffed by “lazy” people who were constantly being ripped off for their labor.
Shame on Don Yelton for being crazy enough to call hard-working students and African Americans lazy. Shame on the Republican Party that he purports to represent. And shame on the state of North Carolina for its attempt to suppress the vote. Shame, too, on the other states around the nation who, like North Carolina, have made voter suppression a priority.
Julianne Malveaux is a D.C.-based economist and writer and president emerita of Bennett College for Women.
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