The Rev. Joseph Lowery's proclamation -- that all white people are hell-bound -- apparently isn't controversial enough for President Barack Obama to distance himself from the faith leader. Just days after the Monroe County Reporter highlighted the 91-year-old preacher's alleged race-based proclamation (one that the preacher has since dismissed as a mere joke), Lowery will reportedly spend time with the Obama family on election night.
The Georgia Tipsheet has more the civil rights leader's election-night plans:
...the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Tuesday morning that Lowery, who was among the president’s earliest supporters in the state and delivered the benediction at his 2009 inauguration, would be at the Obama campaign’s election night party in Chicago. A campaign spokeswoman did not respond to a request for confirmation by Tipsheet, however.Lowery has since clarified that his remarks were intended as a joke–one, he said, he’s told a “million” times previously–even as the small-town journalist who first reported them denies that characterization.
Civil rights icon the Rev. Joseph Lowery delivers the keynote address at Clark Atlanta University's fall convocation Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2012, in Atlanta. Lowery urged young people to vote at the event where a voter registration march was planned but cancelled because of the weather. Credit: AP
Lowery, who founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., made the controversial statement about whites and hell during a recent rally at St. James Baptist Church in Forsyth, Georgia. While he said he initially believed as a young militant that Caucasians were hell-bound, he said that this view eventually tempered -- but that he now, once again, embraces this notion.
As TheBlaze's Madeleine Morgenstern reported, The Reporter paraphrased Lowery’s comments and did not provide a direct quote relating to those remarks. Also, it appeared as though he was using hyperbole to make his point, not stating a factual theological conclusion.
The Rev. Joseph Lowery speaks during a press conference with a coalition of civil rights and attorneys groups saying African-American judges are disappearing from the bench in one of Georgia's most heavily-populated black counties and being replaced by white appointees Thursday, May 24, 2012, in Atlanta. Credit: AP
However, his comments about whites -- statements he now claims were said in a joking manner -- weren't the extent of his controversial commentary.
"I don’t know what kind of a n—er wouldn’t vote with a black man running," Lowery reportedly said. "All that he did with the stimulus was genius. Nobody intelligent would risk this country with Romney."
The famed preacher later told The Daily Caller that he doesn't recall uttering these latter quotes.
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