“Fox & Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade defended the Democrat running in Georgia’s gubernatorial race on Tuesday after she admitted to burning the state’s flag during a protest in the 1990s, explaining that it contained a Confederate design at the time.
During a segment Tuesday on the Georgia race, Kilmeade said that it “makes a little bit more sense” to burn the Georgia flag because it contained the Confederate “stars and bars” logo, added to the flag during the 1950s as a negative response to the civil rights activism of the era.
{mosads}”It does make a little bit more sense if you’re burning the Georgia flag if it’s ‘stars and bars,’ and you’re an African-American woman who’s a student in college,” Kilmeade said, before turning to another topic.
Abrams discussed the flag burning Monday ahead of her first debate with Republican Brian Kemp, also Georgia’s secretary of state. It took place during a demonstration in 1992 when Abrams was a college student, and as African Americans and others in Georgia opposed to the flag’s inclusion of the Confederate imagery protested against it.
“During Stacey Abrams’ college years, Georgia was at a crossroads, struggling with how to overcome racially divisive issues, including symbols of the Confederacy, the sharpest of which was the inclusion of the Confederate emblem in the Georgia state flag,” her campaign said in a statement to The New York Times, while not addressing the actual act of flag-burning.
“This conversation was sweeping across Georgia as numerous organizations, prominent leaders, and students engaged in the ultimately successful effort to change the flag,” the statement continues, adding: “Abrams’ time in public service as deputy city attorney and as a state legislative leader have all been focused on bringing people together to solve problems.”
Other conservatives, including The Resurgent’s Erick Erickson, defended Abrams over the protest.
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“I don’t think we should hold it against anyone in the black community being offended by the state flag having the confederate battle flag incorporated into it in the 1950’s as a white protest against the civil rights era. I really don’t,” he wrote.
A RealClearPolitics average of polls shows Abrams trailing her Republican opponent by two percentage points. If elected, Abrams would become the first black female governor of a U.S. state in history.