A longshot Missouri gubernatorial candidat e with ties to the Ku Klux Klan will stay on the Republican ticket, a judge ruled Friday.

Cole County Circuit Court Judge Cotton Walker denied a request by the Missouri GOP to kick Darrell McClanahan out of the August Republican primary.

McClanahan is running against Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe, state Sen. Bill Eigel and others for the GOP nomination to replace Gov. Mike Parson, who is barred by term limits from seeking reelection.

McClanahan’s lawyer, Dave Roland, said the ruling ensures that party leaders do not have “almost unlimited discretion to choose who’s going to be allowed on a primary ballot.”

  • ME5SENGER_24@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    I think I already know the answer and I think it’s because doing so would expose tons already in power, and even more in the past.

    But, why hasn’t the KKK been labeled a terrorist organization in the US?

    • quindraco
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      6 months ago

      You can be on a primary ballot while in prison, serving time for a terrorism conviction. Criminality just isn’t relevant.

    • ForgotAboutDre@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      They aren’t enemies of the state. Groups are classed as terrorists when they are using violence and terror to attack a nation state government, or its interests. The KKK don’t challenge the state in this way, they terrorise people and they support violence. But they don’t define themselves or act as enemies to the state.

      I think they should be classed as hate groups and possibly terrorists. They do use terror to try to enact social change. The social change they want is more of a regression than a revolution, so it can be easy for conservatives to sympathise with them. Conservatives make up half the political power in most countries so it’s hard to classify these types of groups as terrorists. These groups advocate for conservation of social norms, just the norms they want to preserve are oppression and lack of civil rights.