Stacey Abrams's Burning of Georgia Flag With Confederate Symbol Surfaces on Eve of Debate

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

ATLANTA — At a protest on the steps of the Georgia Capitol in 1992, Stacey Abrams, now the Democratic candidate for governor, joined in the burning of the state flag, which at the time incorporated the Confederate battle flag design and was viewed by many as a lingering symbol of white supremacy.

Ms. Abrams’s role in the protest, which took place around the end of her freshman year at Spelman College in Atlanta, has begun to emerge on social media on the eve of her first debate Tuesday with her Republican opponent, Secretary of State Brian Kemp. Mr. Kemp and his allies have sought to portray her as “too extreme for Georgia.”

If elected, Ms. Abrams, 44, would become the first black female governor in the nation. In August 2017, after the violent white supremacist demonstrations in Charlottesville, Va., Ms. Abrams injected the issue of Confederate memorials into the governor’s race by calling for the removal of the giant Confederate carving on Stone Mountain, a granite outcropping east of Atlanta, noting, correctly, its ties to white supremacy and the revival of the Ku Klux Klan.

Mr. Kemp, who is white, has said that Georgians should not “attempt to rewrite” the past, and said he would protect the monument from “the radical left.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/stacey-abrams-burning-of-georgia-flag-with-confederate-symbol-surfaces-on-eve-of-debate/ar-BBOLTh6?li=BBnbcA1

If they want to burn that participation trophy that's fine by me.

[BeckyDem]

1. I hope she doesn't apologize for doing that.

Stand strong, Stacey.

[struggle4progress]

7. Abrams acknowledges participation in burning of '56 Georgia flag

... Stacey Abrams late Monday confirmed that she participated in the 1992 burning of the Georgia state flag and the Confederate battle emblem that had been attached to it during the ‘50s fight over segregation ...

The Confederate emblem had been attached in 1956, during a period of “massive resistance” against the U.S. Supreme Court’s Brown vs. Board of Education decision to end school segregation.

That flag was finally hauled down in 2001 by Gov. Roy Barnes, an act that contributed to his defeat in 2002 by Sonny Perdue, the first Republican elected governor of Georgia during the modern era ...

https://politics.myajc.com/blog/politics/eve-debate-stacey-abrams-acknowledges-participating-burning-georgia-flag/ZH6E9s1CQOLO89PfdarlpL/

[BeckyDem]

9. Good, its honest.

[yurbud]

10. no kidding! That's the only way it becomes a liability

She should turn it to a strength and say it's time to take the slavery & Klan loving coded symbols out of their government.

If you want to display racist symbols on your property, wear them, or get them tattooed on your forehead, go ahead.

But don't use taxpayer money to massage the egos of racists.

[BeckyDem]

12. Yes and it sounds like she will not let them walk over her. She seems tough to me, I like her.

[Squinch]

2. Good. It was an act of decency.

[struggle4progress]

3. Georgia could just update the Stone Mountain carving

[Hoyt]

17. LOL. Love suggesting to white wingers sandblasting that carving and making it civil rights memorial.

Their "heritage" BS just cracks me up.

That mountain has such a history of KKK rallies, and was actually owned by a "Grand Wizzard," or whatever they were called, before the state acquired it.

[Garrett78]

4. So, even at age 18, she had a lot of sense. I like her even more now.

[maxsolomon]

5. they've been saving that one up for maximum effect

expect it to blanket the airwaves till election day. but will it scare whipipo enough?

[gratuitous]

6. The tip came in to the New York Times from

[e-mail]

[saidsimplesimon]

8. This was reported in earlier blogs.

I don't think it merits repeating. just my opinion

Go Georgia, Go Stacey!

[struggle4progress]

11. I remember Stacey Abrams's small, peaceful protest

By Ed Kilgore

On a rainy Monday morning in June of 1992, I happened to have a meeting in the Georgia State Capitol (I was communications director for U.S. senator Sam Nunn at the time). Upon arriving, I learned a demonstration against the Confederate flag insignia that segregationists added to the state flag in 1956 would soon begin on the steps outside. But it looked like a war was imminent: Just inside the doors at the Capitol, there was a phalanx of State Building Authority police officers in full riot gear. Walking behind their ranks, peering over them to see what was happening at the protest site, was none other than former governor Lester Maddox, the last of the state’s segregationist governors. Turns out he was, like me, just there for a meeting, but for all the world it looked like those mostly black cops were there protecting ol’ Lester from civil-rights protesters.

I went about my business, and I suppose Maddox did, too; meanwhile a brief protest took place just outside the building. The general feeling at the time was that the state had massively overreacted to a small, peaceful demonstration ...

... the flag protesters were outnumbered not just by nearby riot police, but by Georgia Bureau of Investigation agents taking snapshots and trying to intimidate the young college students carrying out the protest. They briefly set fire to the 1956 flag. The rain probably extinguished the fire pretty quickly.

Another piece of context is crucial to this story: Just two weeks earlier, Governor Miller, a Democrat who had once been Maddox’s chief of staff (and who would be a supporter of many conservative candidates later in his career), had called for getting rid of the Confederate emblems on the Georgia flag — a stance that quickly gained the support of soon-to-be U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a conservative Republican from Georgia. So the position, if not the incendiary behavior, of the June protesters was very much in the political mainstream (though it would take another near-decade for the flag to change, under Governor Roy Barnes in 2001) ...

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/10/stacey-abrams-1992-flag-burning-peaceful-protest.html

[BeckyDem]

13. Perfect!

[struggle4progress]

14. History of Georgia's state flag

... The Georgia state flag was changed Feb. 13, 1956, incorporating a Confederate battle emblem into the design, as a response to the Supreme Court rulings on desegregating schools ...

The Georgia Legislature approved a new flag in 2001, during the administration of Gov. Roy Barnes ... The flag .. would be a short-lived banner ...

Even though Georgians were finally given a chance to vote on which flag would fly over state institutions, some were unhappy that the 1956 flag design was not among the choices. The design was approved in a March 2004 referendum held on the same day as the 2004 presidential primary in Georgia ...

https://www.ajc.com/news/local/history-georgia-state-flag-things-know/rQ0DK2QtuSP13EStbLC5iK/

[spanone]

15. the right loves this 'gotcha' bullshit. I don't blame her one bit.

[Hoyt]

16. Makes me and a lot of others glad we voted for her. What is worrisome is that KKKemp

is hitting hard with some ads to discredit Abrams and paint her as a "socialist" -- like that is bad thing -- easy on criminals, can't manage her own finances, etc.

One of KKKemp's recent ads has a visually "bright" white lady criticizing Abrams for not voting for some proposed sex offender law that was later enacted with needed changes. Of course, they accuse Abrams of being easy on sexual offenders, and then the white winger (probably an actor) says something like, "And I am a victim." Christ, I despise southern white wingers.

[lancelyons]

18. It was a racist confederate flag