When news broke this week about the torching and defacing of a black church in Greenville, the knee-jerk conclusion of some — mostly politicians who thrive on playing up race or are scarred by their past experiences with racial oppression — was that this had to be a racially and politically motivated crime.
U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, whose district includes the Delta and the state’s lone African-American in Congress, was a prime example. He issued a statement the day after the arson, suggesting the crime was designed to influence next week’s presidential election.
Thompson may have reason for jumping to that conclusion. After all, there were the words “Vote Trump” spray-painted, apparently by the arsonist, on the side of the church. Trump’s campaign indeed has been marred by racial overtones, and Democrats contend that some of the Republican’s most steadfast supporters have racist, and potentially violent, leanings. And Mississippi had a history of burning and blowing up black churches during the civil rights movement, as these houses of worship were also often the gathering places for those who led the movement to end segregation, voter disenfranchisement and other forms of unconscionable discrimination against African-Americans at that time.
It is interesting, however, to note that apparently plenty of African-Americans who live in Greenville aren’t so sure it was a white person who set Hopewell Missionary Baptist Church on fire. According to a story published in The Clarion-Ledger today, most of the black persons interviewed by the Jackson newspaper — people who live in the neighborhood where the church is located or have connections there — suspect that a black person is the arsonist and painted the “Vote Trump” as a ruse to throw off investigators.
No one knows the truth at this point. Either scenario — politically motivated hate crime, or a ploy made to look like one — is plausible. It would be incorrect to conclude either is what happened until investigators solve the crime. The FBI, which is conducting its own civil rights investigation along with the arson probe by local authorities, says it would be premature to draw any conclusion.
Thompson and anyone else who suggests differently have their own biases or their own political motivations for doing so.
