The racism card is off the table.
In the contentious school board race for the seat representing the peninsula, the NAACP and others were claiming charter school organizers were supporting a black and a white candidate in hopes that the black man, Marvin Stewart, would syphon off just enough of the black votes to ensure the white man, Robert Russell would beat incumbent Toya Green.
Well, that argument is over. Russell announced today that he’s leaving the race and throwing his support behind Stewart. Meaning that two black advocates for Charleston’s public schools would be running for the seat, with the question of racism off the table.
Park Dougherty, the leader of the Charleston Charter School for Math and Science was accused by School Board Chairman Hillery Douglas of supporting the two men to split the black vote and secure the white guy the win. As we noted in a previous post, Dougherty was likely less interested in the racial shake-up at the ballot box and more concerned about who would support area charter schools. Green has voted against the charter school and both Stewart and Russell have been supporters.
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