Charleston Killer's Favorite Racist Gave A Bunch Of Money To Top Republicans, Oops

By now you've probably read about what's believed to be Dylann Roof's idiot manifesto, detailing all his insights into The Blacks and The Jews. It's the usual loathsome pile of racist crap, but he does at least let us know where he got a lot of his ideas: from the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC), the modern version of what used to be the "White Citizens Councils" of the '50s and '60s. And here's a heck of a thing: Earl Holt, the leader of the racist group, has given buttloads of money to Republican candidates in the last few years, not that they agree with him, oh no no no, he's despicable. But he has a checkbook.

In a pretty smart bit of investigating,  The Guardian  reports that CCC leader Earl Holt has

donated $65,000 to Republican campaign funds in recent years while inflammatory remarks – including that black people were “the laziest, stupidest and most criminally-inclined race in the history of the world” – were posted online in his name.

Among his many enthusiasms, Holt contributed $8500 to Ted Cruz and his PAC. On some of his FEC filings, Holt whimsically listed his occupation as "slumlord." Cruz's campaign has promised that it "will be immediately refunding the donation.”

He also donated $1500 to Rick Santorum; a spokesman for the Frothy One didn't say anything about returning the money, but did email The Guardian to say, “Senator Santorum does not condone or respect racist or hateful comments of any kind. Period. The views the Senator campaigns on are his own and he is focused on uniting America, not dividing her.” So that's nice.

Holt gave Rand Paul's PAC $2,250; a Paul staffer said that rather than returning the money to Holt, the PAC will donate the money to the Mother Emanuel Hope Fund "to assist the victims' families," which is a pretty classy gesture that only leaves us wondering what insane dumbfuckery Paul will follow it up with, because this is Rand Paul we're talking about.

 The Guardian also reports that Holt donated $2000 to Mitt Romney's 2012 campaign, as well as to a gaggle of current and former Republican members of Congress:

Representative Steve King of Iowa ($2,000), Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas ($1,500) and Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona ($1,000). He also gave $3,200 to the former Minnesota congresswoman and presidential candidate Michele Bachmann.

Because Holt cares about America so very much. He also likes to spread the word that The Blacks are a bunch of animals who are addicted to crime and welfare, a message that was very attractive to Dylann Roof. Roof explained in his manifesto that after Trayvon Martin attacked George Zimmerman with a sidewalk and his big black body, he went on the Google machine, where he learned all the True Facts of "black on white violence" by reading the CCC website. “I have never been the same since that day,” he wrote. 

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As the Daily Beast details, the White Citizens Councils were a sort of unsheeted version of the Klan: every bit as racist, but without all the silly rituals and words starting with "K," and more likely to talk about preserving order and the American/Southern Way than about pollution of precious white bloodlines. And while the modern version is just as racist, it's managed to pretend to respectability, and has been rewarded with plenty of pandering from Republican politicians, including former Mississippi Sen. Trent Lott; Bob Barr, former congressman from Georgia; and Mike Huckabee, who backed away from the group after learning that they'd scheduled him to appear onstage with a Holocaust denier. In 2010, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour had all sorts of nice things to say about the Citizens' Councils, explaining that they weren't like the KKK at all, they were just terrific civic leaders. And in 2013, a member of Nikki Haley's re-election committee was forced to resign when her ties to the CCC were exposed. Not surprisingly, Ann Coulter has also vigorously defended the CCC, which she said was simply more "aggressive" than the Liberal Media about reporting all the black-on-white crime that happens all the time, which isn't racist, it's just good journalism or something.

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And while Holt is certainly proud that his message is getting out there, he's also very sure that his organization should not be associated with Roof's murder spree, because he is only reporting The Facts. In a statement, Holt said it was "not surprising" that Roof found enlightenment at the CCC:

The CofCC is one of perhaps three websites in the world that accurately and honestly report black-on-white violent crime, and in particular, the seemingly endless incidents involving black-on-white murder.

The CofCC website exists because media either “spike” such stories, or intentionally obscure the race of black offenders.

But hey, Holt's not responsible for what some crazy person might do with all that quality information: "The CofCC is hardly responsible for the actions of this deranged individual merely because he gleaned accurate information from our website." In fact, he says, he's no more responsible than the manufacturer of the ammunition used "by Colin Ferguson to murder six whites on the Long Island Railroad in 1993." That's pretty cool how he manages to call attention to the murderous impulses of The Blacks even as he denies any responsibility for arming Roof with an ideology.

Holt also cares about what The Blacks are doing to this great country; he is a regular commenter on rightwing websites, and a former director of the CCC confirmed that web comments under the name "Earl P Holt III" were probably his pal Earl. Among the bits of brilliance Holt shared online were comments about how he'd gotten tons of guns so that he wouldn't get murdered by The Blacks, and also, in a comment on The Blaze in February 2014, he warned that there's just no hope of improving Those People:

If you think you can educate them, or embarrass them, or reason with them, or that your Christian compassion will be reciprocated, then you are the kind of person who will be completely baffled when they kill you, rape your entire family, and burn your house to the ground.

As The Guardian notes, that sounds a little like Roof's explanation to one of the survivors in Charleston: "I have to do it. You rape our women and you’re taking over our country." Not that Earl Holt or his merry band of racists bear any responsibility for the actions of someone who took those messages very, very seriously. He was a lone nut, after all, and probably just hated Christians. And you certainly can't blame Republicans for accepting donations from a group that simply wants to defend Christianity.

[ Guardian via NYT / Daily Beast / The Hill / Daily Beast again]