Social media representing two Republican senators, Marco Rubio of Florida and Dan Sullivan of Alaska, mistakenly posted photos of the late Congressman Elijah Cummings along with comments intended to honor John Lewis.
The posts were quickly reviewed with photos of Lewis, the civil rights leader and lawmaker who died Friday at the age of 80.
Rubio acknowledged the mistake and showed a video of himself with Lewis.
“Earlier today I tweeted an incorrect photo,” he wrote. “John Lewis was a true American hero. I had the honor of appearing together in Miami three years ago at an event captured in the video below. May God grant you eternal rest. “
Sullivan’s Facebook tribute to Lewis featured a photo of Sullivan and Cummings, a Maryland congressman who died last year, at the opening of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.
The revised tribute omitted the reference to the museum, and the photo was replaced by a photo of Lewis alone. The changes were made without comment. In response to an email, Sullivan spokesman Mike Anderson wrote: “Senator Sullivan’s staff made a mistake in trying to honor an American legend.”
Lewis, an Atlanta Democrat, was the last survivor of the six great civil rights activists, led by Martin Luther King.
He was best known for leading 600 protesters in the bloody Sunday march of 1965 across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. Lewis was knocked to the ground and beaten by state police. Televised images forced the country’s attention on racial oppression.
Lewis represented a district of Atlanta from 1987 until his death. Cummings, a fellow civil rights activist who won 12 terms in Congress representing a district in Maryland, died last October, at age 68.
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