Screen grab from Barr ad “End DEI Nonsense”
Andy Barr, the Great White Hope?
He seems to say so with new ad
By Scott White
Wooodford Sun Staff
After finishing law school, I moved to Charlotte, North Carolina, to practice with a small law firm, primarily practicing in federal and state criminal defense. As I had growing up and going to school and university in Versailles and Lexington, I became involved in Charlotte with the local Democratic party . . . handling pro bono election law cases, including a few voting rights cases, training volunteers on what was lawful and unlawful on election day, manning a fraud hotline and things like that.
As a result, I got to know Charlotte’s remarkably successful first Black mayor and award-winning architect, Harvey Gantt. Folks likely do not remember the 1990 U.S. Senate race pitting Gantt against three-term incumbent Jesse Helms. Trust me, in 1990, it was one of the most-watched elections in the country and was often covered closely by the national press.
Even so, I had not thought of that election in years.
But, watching one of the most recent television and social media advertisements broadcast by Congressman Andy Barr, whose district includes Woodford County, gave me an immediate sense of déjà vu.
In the ad, Barr says, “It’s not a sin to be White. It’s not against the law to be male. And, it shouldn’t be disqualifying to be Christian. I am Andy Barr, and I approve this message to give woke Liberals something else to cry about.”
The Barr ad focuses on the ginned-up controversy over Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), which has seemed to dominate much of our public discourse and elections in the last few years. It is hard to divine whether Barr, a scion of a wealthy Lexington family, a father, husband and a graduate of a top university and law school, is sincere about what he is saying.
I mean, anyone who has been in or closely around a campaign knows well that ad content is primarily informed by polling data and other analyses. And, given that DEI-themed ads have been one of the leading wedge points of Republican candidates around the country, it seems reasonable to believe those are the reasons we are seeing this ad all over our televisions and social media platforms.
To see the ad in its entirety with a transcript, you can visit Barr’s campaign website: https://barrforsenate.com/press-release/barr-stop-dei-ad-inflames-woke-leftists-kicks-off-1m-buy-throughout-the-commonwealth/
Well, whether he believes what he is saying or not is irrelevant. He is saying it, and he is saying that it is one of the main reasons he is running for the U.S. Senate.
As we celebrate our 250th anniversary as the United States of America, and as someone with a history degree and who reads widely on the topics of U.S. history, I am having a difficult time thinking of anytime in our history in which White, male, Christians were ever a minority, ever discriminated against by the law due to their color, gender or religion (excepting some Christian sects in Colonial times and virulent anti-Catholic discrimination from the mid-19th to the mid-20th century), or whose lives or economic status or opportunities were ever at risk in the U.S.
So, after watching Barr’s new advertisement seemingly on repeat ad nauseam, I shook my head. Feels like I am re-experiencing the Gantt-Helms race 35 years ago.
So, what about that ad? North Carolina has a troublesome, to say the least, racial history as one of the states that made up the Confederacy, which fought for the maintenance of slavery. North Carolina perpetuated the Black Crow system of segregation well into the 1960s – in fact, as a broadcaster based in Raleigh, Helms rose to prominence championing the ways of the Old South while coming out strongly against all of the signature Civil Rights legislation in the early and mid-1960s.
Helms was vulnerable in the 1990 election—the economy was trending towards a recession. Helms, though still powerful, had just lost a major battle fighting on the side of cigarette manufacturers, and was experiencing health issues. Into this stepped Gantt, a younger, progressive mayor of a major North Carolina city, and a doyen of the growing banking and financial class fueling the explosion of Charlotte.
When the race predictably tightened in the closing weeks with Gantt showing polling momentum, Helms responded with an ad so blatantly ugly it could only be deemed racist. The ad focused on the loss of jobs in North Carolina’s textile mills . . . an industry similar in import to coal in Kentucky. The ad depicts the hands of a white man in a plaid shirt reading and then crumpling a job rejection letter. A somber voice over states, “You needed that job, and you were the best qualified. But they had to give it to a minority because of a racial quota. Is that really fair?”
The Helms campaign’s use of the “White Hands” ad was widely credited with shifting momentum in the final days, contributing to Helms’ narrow victory. Political scientists have since cited the “white hands” Helms ad as an example of racial dog-whistling tactics.
Comparing the Helms ad in 1990 to Barr’s ad today is startling in their similarity. The Helms ad worked. Will Barr’s ad produce a similar result in his hotly contested race against another Black candidate, former attorney general and Republican gubernatorial candidate Daniel Cameron? If so, will that theme still animate Barr’s campaign against whoever comes out of the Democratic primary?
And, for each of us individually and as a community, more importantly, what do we conclude about this ad’s purposes and intentions?
To be clear . . . neither the Sun nor I are saying Barr is a racist. We are not urging you to vote for or against Barr.
What we are doing is providing information for you to consider when you answer those two questions for yourself.