The Post and Courier and the Associated Press have been dogging state lawmakers since the Emanuel AME shootings about their position on a proposal to remove the Confederate flag. On Monday, they announced that according to the P&C count, both chambers have reached the two-thirds majority needed to remove the flag. Source: Washington Post/AP
Don’t worry, guys, the Ku Klux Klan says a July 18 event in Columbia “should be a peaceful rally”, protesting the idea that South Carolina politicians would remove the Confederate flag from the Statehouse grounds. A leader of the North Carolina-based Klan group says they’ll hold a cross burning later in the night, at the local Grand Dragon’s house 20 miles from Statehouse. Source: WIS, Washington Post
Meanwhile, capitol police arrested a man who confronted some flag protesters and a fight broke out Monday night. Source: AP
State investigators say that “lone wolf”-style attacks like Emanuel AME Church shootings are the hardest to track and prevent. Source: P&C
Funeral services for Rev. Daniel Simmons Sr., the final of the Emanuel Nine to be memorialized, will be held today at Greater St. Luke AME in downtown. Source: AP
Fusion talks with a minister at Charlotte’s Briar Creek Road Baptist Church, one of five black churches that have reportedly been burned since the Emanuel shootings. (The most recent in Warrenville, S.C.) Asked if she believes it was a hate crime, co-pastor Rhonda Kinsey says, “I don’t want to believe that.” Source: Fusion, WaPo
Washington Post’s Karen Tumulty talks with S.C. state Sen. Paul Thurmond, the youngest son of segregationist Strom Thurmond. Thurmond took the floor in the state Senate last week and rejected the Confederate flag as a symbol of Southern heritage. Source: WaPo
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