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NC Republican Chair Loses Job After Racist Daily Show Interview

Alex Constantine - October 25, 2013

" ... He said if the law 'hurts a bunch of lazy blacks who just want the government to give them everything, so be it.' ... ”

Well, that didn’t take long. Less than 24 hours after he appeared on The Daily Show to defend a new voter-ID law North Carolina county precinct GOP chair Don Yelton has resigned from his post. And according to a party spokesman, it was a direct result of the interview.

“Yes, he has resigned,” said Nathan West, a spokesman for the Buncombe County Republican Party. According to Business Insider, West said that the party asked for Yelton’s resignation in “direct response to the interview.”

So what did Yelton say in his interview with The Daily Show’s Aasif Mandvi that was so objectionable? He insisted that the voter-ID law is “not racist” before admitting that he’s been called a “bigot” in the past. He defended a picture of President Obama “sitting on a stump as a witch doctor” as making fun of the “white half” of the president. He said if the law “hurts a bunch of lazy blacks who just want the government to give them everything, so be it.”

When Yelton started throwing around the “n-word” and complaining that only black people are allowed to use it, Mandvi stopped him to ask, “You know that we can hear you, right?” It only made things worse that Yelton’s ignorance was presented in contrast to the reasoned arguments of Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), the historic civil rights leader, who marched with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

In a statement, the Buncombe County GOP said, “Mr. Yelton’s comments are offensive, uniformed, and unacceptable of any member within the Republican Party. In no way are his comments representative of the local or state Republican Party.”

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/gop-chair-loses-job-after-racist-daily-show-interview/