BRACK: McMaster needs to go to apology school

By Andy Brack  |  S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster doesn’t need to go into comedy anytime soon.  He’s just not that funny.

What he needs to do is to go to apology school.

The governor, who often sounds like Foghorn Leghorn these days, had this to say to fellow Republicans last week at a state convention: “I look forward to the day that Democrats are so rare, we have to hunt them with dogs.” 

Umm. Not funny, governor.  Really not funny.  Even if you claim you’ve been saying it for years, it has never been funny.

Democrats responded with outrage about McMaster’s dog-whistle of a comment.

“Yesterday, Governor Henry McMaster threatened me, my family and thousands of other Anderson County residents who are Democrats when he said he looks forward to the day he can ‘hunt us with dogs,’” said Chris Salley, chairman of the Anderson County Democratic Party, in a statement.  

Charleston County Democratic Party Chairman Sam Skardon went further: “We cannot continue to normalize threats of political violence from the leadership of the Republican Party. If the governor does not retract and apologize, S.C. State Law Enforcement Division should investigate this threat.”

One man who lived through apartheid in South Africa recalled on Facebook how many people in that country were silent about its system of segregation: “Their silence spoke volumes. If you do not stand up against racism, if you remain silent, you are part of the problem.”

But maybe McMaster, a former attorney general who should know about keeping the peace more than inciting it, thought what he said was hilarious.  The governor of any state should know better, particularly in an America today more polarized by race, fear and hate than in years.  

What our governor said was mean, mean-spirited and filled with racial undertones of South Carolina’s ugly past in which white elites subjugated enslaved Africans and actually did hunt them when they escaped.  Or hanged them, such as when Charlestonians executed Denmark Vesey and 34 others for what was purported to be a planned slave uprising.  Or they just plain lynched them after the Civil War to reignite fear to fuel horrible decades of home-grown Jim Crow apartheid.

It’s not a history of which to be proud.  

But predictably, the spin-doctors and fixers played McMaster’s comment off as a light-hearted joke.  That’s what the embarrassment playbook says to do – just foist anything out on a lazy public that the person saying the trash didn’t really mean it.  

Here’s how the Washington Post reported on the remark: “In a statement Monday, a spokesman for McMaster said the governor had been saying the line at GOP conventions for years, adding that ‘everyday South Carolinians understand that it’s a joke.’”

The joke might have worked in the 1950s, which is where McMaster and his buddies seem to want us to return.  But rather than continuing to brush off the remark, the governor needs to realize he represents all South Carolinians, not just the ones who may look like him.  

To drive this point home:  Just imagine what would happen if a blue state governor started talking about crucifying pro-life activists.  And then said it was just a joke.  I bet McMaster, Fox News and most Republicans would squeal like stuck pigs.  The vitriol surely would be intergalactic.

So governor, let’s lay off the bad jokes, the over-the-top rhetoric and the increasingly hostile politics that continue to pull people apart.  There’s not going to be any Kumbaya moment in South Carolina anytime soon, but you can stop throwing gas on the fire.

Andy Brack, recognized in 2022 as the best columnist in South Carolina, is editor and publisher of Statehouse Report and the Charleston City Paper.  Have a comment?  Send to: feedback@charlestoncitypaper.com.