A newspaper in a small city in Alabama that drew condemnation over an editorial calling for the Ku Klux Klan to “ride again” has a new editor and publisher: a 46-year-old black woman.

The new editor, Elecia R. Dexter, is taking over The Democrat-Reporter, a weekly newspaper serving Linden in western Alabama, at a “pivotal time,” the newspaper said in a statement.

“You may have full confidence in her ability to handle these challenging times,” it said.

The newspaper’s longtime editor, Goodloe Sutton, who is white, stepped down this week amid widespread criticism of an editorial he wrote railing against “Democrats in the Republican Party and Democrats” and calling for the return of the most infamous white supremacist group in the nation’s history. In an interview with The Montgomery Advertiser, he went even further, suggesting that the Klan “go up there and clean out D.C.”

The editorial made national news. The University of Southern Mississippi and Auburn University rescinded past honors given to Mr. Sutton, and the Alabama Press Association suspended the membership of The Democrat-Reporter and censured Mr. Sutton.