http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-attorney-general-jeff-sessions-racist-remarks_us_582cd73ae4b099512f80c0c2
Jeff Sessions Was Deemed Too Racist To Be A Federal Judge. He’ll Now Be Trump’s Attorney General.
He once joked that he only took issue with the KKK’s drug use and referred to civil rights groups as “un-American.”
WASHINGTON ― "The man who President-elect Donald Trump will nominate as the 84th attorney general of the United States was once rejected as a federal judge over allegations he called a black attorney “boy,” suggested a white lawyer working for black clients was a race traitor, joked that the only issue he had with the Ku Klux Klan was their drug use, and referred to civil rights groups as “un-American” organizations trying to “force civil rights down the throats of people who were trying to put problems behind them.”
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), an early Trump supporter who has been playing a major role on the Trump transition team, met with the president-elect in New York on Thursday. In a statement, the Trump team said the president-elect was “unbelievably impressed” with Sessions...
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Sessions’ nomination was ultimately defeated in June 1986, making him the first Reagan nominee the Senate Judiciary Committee rejected.
Before his rejection, Sessions told senators he denied many of the claims made against him and that he felt he had been “caricatured.”
“All of us know that when the confidence of a private conversation is breached by a party with ulterior motives or one who simply misunderstands what the speaker says or means, the speaker can always be embarrassed,” Sessions said. “I enjoy repartee and frequently engage in devil’s advocacy. In short, when I talk to friends, I do not guard every word that I say because I think that I know they know that my commitment to equality and justice is real, and they would not twist my words or misinterpret what I am saying to them.”
“I deny as strongly as I can express it that I am insensitive to the concerns of blacks,” Sessions said.
Hebert, like many civil rights advocates, is deeply concerned about the future of the Civil Rights Division in a Trump administration. He referenced the politicization of the Civil Rights Division under former President George W. Bush, when political officials abandoned much of the division’s work.
“I fear we’ll see a repeat of that, or perhaps worse,” Hebert said. “I worry about those who are in the Civil Rights Division now, and what it will do to their careers. But more importantly, what it’s going to do to minority voters, minority citizens, across the country who need their basic fundamental human rights protected.”
“Just the thought of him overseeing the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division is frightening,” Hebert said. “He’s a mean-spirited individual.”..."
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