The two-term mayor of a small Ohio town has apologized for alleging that “blacks have all but formally declared war on whites” in a Friday Facebook post.
Hillsboro mayor Drew Hastings, a former stand-up comic, took Friday’s fatal shooting at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado as an opportunity to share his thoughts on America’s frayed race relations.
“When are people going to figure out that we are in a Revolution in this Country,” Hastings wrote in the post, as quoted by The Hillsboro Times Gazette. “Blacks have all but formally declared war on whites, ideological types are fighting with Planned Parenthood, there’s violence over immigration, Muslim extremism, and our own Government at war with its citizens.”
“This isn’t ‘lone wolf’ stuff,” he continued. “It isn’t a crazy with a gun. It isn’t ‘domestic terrorism,’ these are all skirmishes in a Revolution that’s here. Pick your side and pick your battles, we are about 3 steps away from All bets are off.”
The Times Gazette reported Monday that Hastings took down the post over the weekend after receiving backlash from community members. He told the paper that though “a lot of people responded positively,” he was concerned about offending African-American Hillsboro residents.
In a rambling apology to the newspaper, Hastings insisted that he was “venting” but that the country needs a “real, honest dialogue about race.”
His frequent social media postings reflect a combination of his conservative views and comedian past. In one recent post, written on Thanksgiving, Hastings made a crack linking the Black Lives Matter movement to the annual Black Friday shopping frenzy.
“Black Fridays Matter,” the post, which is still up on his page, read.
h/t Jezebel
