A Republican Alabama lawmaker said he has no plans to resign after days of backlash over posting a photo celebrating the birthday of a Ku Klux Klan leader, the same day the state honored the late civil rights icon, the Representative. John Lewis.
State Representative Will Dismukes, R-Prattville, resigned as pastor of Pleasant Hill Baptist Church on Wednesday after a now-deleted Facebook post celebrated a “good time” in celebration of Confederate Army General Nathan Bedford Forrest’s birthday. in Selma, reports The Alabama Baptist.
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Mel Johnson, of the Alabama Baptist Association, told the newspaper that Dismukes, who served as a bi-national pastor, met with church officials Tuesday before resigning.
Johnson called his actions – offering an invocation at the event in front of several Confederate flags and a portrait of Forrest – a “misjudgment.”
Alabama State Representative Will Dismukes resigned as pastor of his church.
(ALABAMA STATE HOUSE)
“Perception is reality in many people’s minds,” Johnson told the Washington Post. “We work to avoid the very appearance of evil. I’m not saying I had bad intentions.
Dismukes addressed it in a Facebook post that is no longer active, WSFA reports:
“After a conversation with the association, I resigned from Pleasant Hill Baptist Church not at the request of the church, but by choice because I did not want to see SBC vote for Pleasant Hill for fraternity,” Dismukes wrote. “The Lord will lead me to a church in his time and direction.”
Republican and Democratic lawmakers in the state quickly denounced his office earlier this week; The Alabama Democratic Party chairman called him “totally insensitive,” reports advertiser Montgomery.
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State Representative Danny Garrett, who is also the majority whip in the state House of Representatives, tweeted Sunday that he could not understand why someone “in 2020 celebrates the birthday of the first great wizard KKK”, adding that Dismukes’ comments did not they represent that of Republican lawmakers. in the state legislature.
The Alabama Democratic Party previously asked Dismukes to resign in late June after he served as chaplain for the Prattville Dragoons, a chapter of the Sons of the Confederacy, the newspaper reports.
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The birthday came when the late Representative John Lewis, an Alabama native who was a leader in the civil rights movement, was being honored. Dismukes, in a long Facebook post on Monday, said his post “was in no way related to disrespect” Lewis, who died earlier this month of pancreatic cancer at the age of 80.
“That was not even a thought in my mind,” wrote Dismukes. “That is not who I am as a person.”
