File this under GOP rebranding efforts.

TPM’s Perry Stein today reports that the Virginia GOP, fresh after nominating the ultraconservative ticket of Ken Cuccinelli and E.W. Jackson, has now appointed Rev. Joe Ellison as the party’s Director of African-American Engagement.

Republican Party of Virginia chairman Pat Mullins hailed Ellison for his “knowledge and experience,” and Ellison said that he will help build “the future of our party” by showing black voters that they “share far more values with the Republican Party than they realize.”

As Stein notes, Ellison in 2010 announced that he is “declaring war against Planned Parenthood” and applauded televangelist Pat Robertson’s claim that Haiti was devastated by a deadly earthquake as divine retribution for making a “pact with the Devil” 200 years ago.