(CHARLESTON, S.C.) Lying about Black people is nothing new in political campaigning.
Despite the thorough debunking of false rumors that Haitian immigrants were eating cats and dogs in Springfield, Ohio, former President Donald Trump and his GOP allies insist on repeating the lies.
“If I have to create stories,” admitted JD Vance, Trump’s running mate , “that’s what I’m going to do.”
While many political observers believe that these lies have, as The New York Times columnist Lydia Polgreen described, finally “ crossed a truly unacceptable line ,” in fact, white politicians have told brazen, fearmongering, racist lies about Black people for over the past 100 years.
One of the more notorious lies occurred in 1908 in another Springfield, this one in Illinois. As a historian who studies the impact of racism on democracy , it’s my belief that what happened there and in other cities helps to clarify what Trump and Vance are trying to do in Springfield, Ohio, today.
Lying when everyone knows you’re lying seems to be the point.