The Lawrence County Republican Party, located in Alabama, issued an apology after they “accidentally” used a picture of the GOP elephant that included Ku Klux Klan imagery.
The group used an image of the infamous elephant, but the white spaces between the animal’s legs emulated hooded Klansmen. The image was from a Google search and once the mistake was pointed out it was quickly changed, party chairman Shanon Terry stated.
Terry also said that he won’t adhere to calls asking him to step down from the county’s school board because of the incident. He told Huntsville’s News 19:
“I will not be resigning from my elected office on the Lawrence County School Board. The voters of District Four elected me to represent them and I am proud of the accomplishments of this administration over the past six years. I look forward to continuing to strive to give every student in Lawrence County the best opportunity to be successful. I regret the mistake that was made, and it was just that- an unintended mistake. The image posted by me on a political Facebook page was not done with any malicious or harmful intent. Once made aware of the negative portion of the picture I immediately replaced it and followed up with an apology/explanation the next day. My error was rushing to post a thank you note to the outgoing chairperson, in doing so I did not properly review a cut and paste image used in that post from an internet search for a ‘GOP elephant.’ I do not support or agree with any hate group agenda and certainly would not try to further their cause.”
The picture had originally been used in a 2020 article featured in Mother Jones which accused the GOP of being racist. The fact that Terry didn’t notice anything inflammatory about the addition of the klansmen speaks volumes.