The Virginia government leadership took racist photos in its youth and unleashed a powerful political scandal

A series of racist scandals involving Democratic leaders puts the Virginia government in a bind. The political crisis worsened after the Virginia Attorney General, Mark Herring, confirmed that in the 1980s, while he was a university student, he was using makeup and a wig to make fun of have African-American look.

Herring regretted his behavior during those years: "It was a minimization of African-Americans and a minimization of a horrible story which I already knew then ".

"This behavior reveals that in my youth I had lack of consciousness, an unforgivable indifference and a lack of sensitivity to the pain that my behavior would cause to others "he maintained.

The revelation created another strong earthquake at the highest levels of state government, where the governor and the secretary of justice are democrats.

Is Herring the next Democrat involved in the racism scandal in Virginia? Before him, other photos revealing similar behaviors on the part of Governor Ralph Northam and his lieutenant governor Justin Fairfax.

Herring – who had previously recommended Northam to resign and was planning to run as governor candidate in 2021 – is apologized for this situation. "insensitive" behavior and noted that in the coming days will announce whether or not you can "continue as an official".

The photo Northam is accused of is from a 1984 student directory made with black paint. The picture shows a person with a black painted face, standing next to another person wearing the hood and the tunic of the racist Ku Klux Klan organization.

Scandal in Florida

In early January, Republican Party Secretary of State Michael Ertel resigned from his post after a photo journal published him. disguised as an African American woman "Hurricane Katrina victim" who caused more than 1800 deaths.

The 2005 photos show Ertel, then aged 35, wearing a purple shirt with the words "Katrina victim", the hurricane that hit the city of New Orleans in 2005 with all its fury.

"When an elected man disguises himself as a" Katrina sufferer ", painted face, hoops and a scarf, he's not just insensitive to the victims of the hurricane: it's the symptom of a epidemic social disease"tweeted the president of the National Association for the Progress of People of Color (NAACP), Cornell Brooks.