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.
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.
That’s an important bit of context, they still didn’t have a proper election.
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.
Legally yes, but part of the article makes it sound like there was a regular election between two candidates with everything you expect and the winner is being denied. That’s not the case and we don’t know how the citizens actually feel about this. It did, after all, take decades for someone to do this.
Not that any of this should have ever happened in the first place, they should have just run the elections normally.
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)?
What are you suggesting happened? Nobody seemed to give a shit for decades even though the situation seems clearly in favour of whoever actually decides to go through the official channels. It sounds like everyone has just been completely apathetic to who’s running the town, including the 85% black majority.
What I mean by “regular” is the kind of election where people go out to vote for one of two or more candidates. Someone winning by default doesn’t say much about what the people want, except that they, once again, don’t seem to really care.
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 don’t see how a small group like that could truly oppress them, especially in an age where everything can easily be documented with video proof and when this case seem clear cut. Someone could have done this ten or twenty years ago. Running a small campaign on the platform of “fuck those racists” should be simple enough in a town with an 85% black majority, but that wasn’t even necessary here because that clique’s so dumb.
Anyway, I’ve made my point, you can have the last word.
That’s wild because it’s literally explained in the article and then quoted by me here. It’s the part of my posts you keep ignoring.
Your questions are not unanswered- the white minority council has evidentially maintained power by ignoring elections and by holding private special elections, like they did in 2020, and by also refusing to allow elections to take place, like they did in 2022.
The only point you’ve made is that reading the article is not a requirement to comment on it.
More like made an ass out of yourself but sure bud
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.
Yes, but in this case a different (much dumber) system had been established for decades without objection it seems. That’s different than just having regular, official elections with just one candidate, which is what they should have done in the first place. We don’t know who would have won if it was a normal, two-candidate election.
This going to court is a good thing because a) anyone could have filed the paperwork and won by default, including someone who would abuse the position and be really terrible for the town and b) this is certainly the end of the unofficial-official system they’ve had and might bring bad stuff to light. But keep in mind that the article’s coming on very strong because they mostly cite the prosecution.