An Alabama newspaper at the center of the outcry KKK appoints a black editor | American News

A newspaper from a small town in Alabama, which this month condemned an editorial calling the "Ku Klux Klan to Ride Again", appointed an African-American woman to the post of editor-in-chief and publisher, said the newspaper.

On Friday, Elecia R. Dexter took the reins of the weekly Democrat-Reporter in Linden, Alabama, from Goodloe Sutton, 79, longtime owner of the newspaper that wrote the Public Fire incendiary editorial .

"Mrs Dexter is coming at a crucial time for the paper and you can have full confidence in her ability to handle these difficult times," the paper said in a statement. It is difficult to know if Sutton remains the owner of the newspaper.

Dexter has "strong roots and a rich history" in the region, and will continue the journal's long journalistic tradition while moving it into a new direction, the statement said.

Sutton, who runs the publication for 50 years, told the Montgomery Advertiser newspaper last week that he had written the editorial that advocated the return of the KKK and stood against the Democrats.

The KKK was a white supremacist group that terrorized blacks in the southern United States and then targeted other minority groups as a result of the civil war and the emancipation of African-American slaves.

"Good riddance, Goodloe," tweeted US Senator Doug Jones, Democrat of Alabama, in response to the announcement of Sutton's resignation. "His dangerous opinions do not represent either Alabama or the small town newspapers of Alabama that do a great job every day."

Sutton and his wife, Jean, were hailed in the 1990s for a series of articles in the Democrat-Reporter that detailed corruption in their local sheriff's department.

Jean Sutton died of cancer in 2003, according to his obituary.

The release of the Democrat-Reporter, which is over 100 years old and is not published online, was about 3,000 in 2015, according to a report published that year in the Montgomery-Advertiser.