Former Klan Leader David Duke Announces U.S. Senate Bid
by Stephen Piggott
Hatewatch, Southern Poverty Law Center, July 22, 2016
https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2016/07/22/former-klan-leader-david-duke-announces-us-senate-bid?utm_campaign=HWNewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_source=EOACLK
After weeks of rumors, David Duke, the former leader of the Knights of the
Ku Klux Klan, has formerly announced his bid for U.S. Senate in his home
state of Louisiana on the last day for qualifying for the race.
"The fact is that European-Americans need at least one man in the United
States Senate, one man in the Congress who will defend their rights and
heritage," Duke said in a video published on YouTube this morning.
Following his announcement, white nationalist Brad Griffin of Occidental
Dissent celebrated the news and endorsed his candidacy:
Duke! Duke! Duke! Because, why not? He is absolutely right. We need one man
in the Senate who is unapologetically pro-White. We need one man in the
Senate who will tell the truth about Jewish power and influence. We need one
man in the Senate who has decades of bona fide conservative nationalist
credentials and experience.
Duke has a long history of political activism in Louisiana, most notably
getting elected to the Louisiana House of Representatives in 1989. Duke got
the attention of the world when, during the 1991 Louisiana governor's
contest, he forced a runoff with the Democratic candidate, Edwin Edwards.
Earlier this year, Duke suggested he might run against Rep. Steve Scalise
(LA-R), a man who gave a speech to Duke’s European-American Unity and Rights
Organization (EURO) in 2002. After his EURO conference attendance was
revealed in late 2014, Scalise claimed, improbably as a local politician and
former neighbor of Duke’s, that he had no idea what EURO was or its
connection to Duke.
Following the Scalise scandal, Duke dropped out of the limelight, doing the
occasional interview and attending Holocaust denial conferences until the
2016 election cycle kicked into gear. Duke and the rest of the radical right
are staunch supporters of Donald Trump and have used his campaign to push
their messages into the mainstream. Throughout the campaign, Duke’s name has
been in the media, most notably in February, when Donald Trump refused to
disavow his support during an interview with CNN.
"I’m overjoyed to see Donald Trump and most Americans embrace most of the
issues I’ve championed for years," Duke said in his announcement video.
Duke no doubt senses an opportunity to use this attention to go even further
than the Trump campaign which has elevated ethno-nationalist appeals to the
forefront of a major American political party.
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