He might not be a member of the Ku Klux Klan, but Sen. Dan Coats, R-Ind., is still troubling.
The Anonymous “hacktivist” network has promised that its offshoot Operation KKK will release the names and email addresses of known Klan members in a data dump Nov. 5, according to the Inquisitr.
In the days preceding the Nov. 5 leak of KKK affiliate email addresses, a Twitter user not affiliated with Anonymous, Amped Attacks, has posted a supposed list of KKK members on pastebin.com.
The list includes a number of political figures, including Sen. Coats.
There is currently no concrete evidence pointing to his involvement in the KKK.
Of course, Sen. Coats has already dismissed the allegation on his personal Twitter account, where he said the idea is just “baseless Internet garbage” and he “deplore(s) all forms of racial discrimination.”
However, it’s no secret that racism and other forms of social injustice still exist, whether or not they are violently perpetuated by tall figures in white robes and pointed hats.
Sometimes they take the shape of House of Representative and Senate bills targeted at minorities and marginalized groups.
According to govtrack.us, Sen. Coats has voted to pass a number of bills that limit the rights and civil liberties of minorities or restricted the services that helped level the economic playing field.
In May 1994, Sen. Coats assented to Senate Bill 1935, which in Sec. 13. read “conferees to the upcoming Senate-House conference ... should totally reject the so-called Racial Justice Act provisions,” a bill passed by the House of Representatives that prevented “racially discriminatory capital sentencing.”
Apparently, Sen. Coats accepts the notion that although minorities have been continuously statistically proven to be more likely to be incarcerated and race has a large sway in capital punishment decisions, racial discrimination is not at play in the criminal justice system.
He also voted against the Employment Nondiscrimination Act in 1996. The act would have prohibited “employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.”
However, the bill was not passed with a vote of 50 nays and 49 yeas, with one abstention.
Sexual orientation is still not a protected class in the United States, according to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Coats continued his streak of opposing LGBTQ rights by voting to define marriage as one man and one woman in the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996.
He even went so far as to cosponsor a senate bill in the wake of the RFRA riots earlier this year to support discrimination against LGBTQ individuals.
The bill actually states that it stands to prohibit the federal government from taking “discriminatory action” against those people who refuse to serve gay people on the basis of their moral or religious beliefs — this is also known as a discriminatory action, senator.
So in regards to his views on discrimination, it seems he does support it, just as long as it’s not against those who are religious.
While the allegations that Coats and the other politicians named on that Pastebin list are actual Ku Klux Klan members remain merely allegations, it does prompt us to take a closer look into his views on the issues.
Those views can remind us that oppression and discrimination do not always have to be overt hate crimes, they can be present in the policy actions of our representative body.
Whatever the intentions of hacker Amped Attacks, it’s imperative we take a look at the real threat and occurrences of discrimination by our politicians.
You clearly don’t have to be a member of the KKK or another hate organization to be oppressive, you could just be a member of Congress.
meickhof@indiana.edu
@maggie_eickhoff
