Bernice King, the daughter of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, called out a Republican Senate candidate for misusing her father’s words to denounce critical race theory.
Ohio candidate Josh Mandel said that liberals who want to advance critical race theory are “stomping on the grave of Martin Luther King,” during a rally for his run for office on Wednesday.
Critical race theory (CRT) has become a point of contention for politicians after former President Donald Trump denounced it and falsely deemed it “racist” in 2020.
Mandel went on to say that MLK had a dream that people would not be judged by the color of their skin and that CRT goes against that. “What you have going on in the government schools by these liberals and the media, by the secular left, by the radical left, they’re trying to make everything about skin color,” he said.
King corrected him on Twitter, saying that is he is not well-educated in her father’s principles and he used her late father’s ideologies incorrectly.
“I invite you, if you truly desire to advance the cause of humanity toward true peace, to study my father’s teachings in full and in context.,” she said in a post directed at Mandel. “Don’t use my father or his grave to increase fear regarding CRT.”
Over the past year, the idea of CRT has been used to incite fears of reverse racism by the GOP.
Originally conceived by legal scholars including Derrick Bell, Jean Stefancic, Kimberlé Crenshaw and Richard Delgado, CRT is a theoretical framework that is used to understand power struggles within society as it relates to race and racism.
The groundbreaking guide has been used by Black scholars to understand the multilayered crux of their oppression and has made way for more inclusive frameworks like Latin Critical Theories, Patricia Hill Collin’s ideation of Black Feminist Thought.
After Trump’s misleading comments about the framework, CRT has been catapulted into the stream of GOP attacks towards liberal ideas.
Subsequently, several states, including Oklahoma, Texas and Florida, have banned the teaching of CRT in their schools.
Critics argue that laws banning CRT promote the “white-washing” of American history, is an effort to hide the racist structures of this country, and denies students from getting the critical gaze to analyze the systemic issues of America— all of which harms students of color the most.
Mandel, who has a history of starting feuds on social media, retorted back to King calling her a “race profiteer” and stating that he would not take civil rights guidance from her.
“Dear @BerniceKing, spare me your lectures,” he said in response to her tweet. “1, Critical Race Theory teaches kids to be racists. 2, Critical Race Theory stomps on the grave of Martin Luther King. 3, I’ll take me civil rights guidance from @AlvedaCKing. Not from race politics profiteers like yourself”
King responded to Mandel, telling him that she kindly invited him to study her father’s teachings instead of misquoting him “out of context and erroneously, to suppress truth.”
Martin Luther King III also backed up his sister and father in a series of tweets.
“I don’t see liberals stomping on my father’s grave. I see a GOP effort to whitewash history,” he said in a response to Mandel. He added that “If we cannot reckon with our country’s past, how are we to heal as a nation? How are we to move forward so that every person is seen as equal and judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin?”
Mandel responded to King III saying the son of MLK “has no idea what he is talking about” and that CRT is “the real virus facing this nation.” Earlier this year, three fundraisers resigned from Mandel’s senate campaign.
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