Kathy Miller called the Black Lives Matter movement ‘a stupid waste of time’ and said low African American voter turnout could be due to ‘the way they’re raised’

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Donald Trump’s campaign chair in a prominent Ohio county has claimed there was “no racism” during the 1960s and said black people who have not succeeded over the past half-century only have themselves to blame.

Kathy Miller, who is white and chair of the Republican nominee’s campaign in Mahoning County, made the remarks during a taped interview with the Guardian’s Anywhere but Washington series of election videos.

If you’re black and you haven’t been successful in the last 50 years, it’s your own fault. You’ve had every opportunity Kathy Miller

“If you’re black and you haven’t been successful in the last 50 years, it’s your own fault. You’ve had every opportunity, it was given to you,” she said.

“You’ve had the same schools everybody else went to. You had benefits to go to college that white kids didn’t have. You had all the advantages and didn’t take advantage of it. It’s not our fault, certainly.”

Miller also called the Black Lives Matter movement “a stupid waste of time” and said lower voter turnout among African Americans could be related to “the way they’re raised”.

Her comments risk further alienating African American voters from Trump in the crucial swing state. No Republican president has reached the White House without also winning Ohio, a state in which 12.7% of the population is black.

Trump has repeatedly stumbled in his push to attract black voters, an effort that began with his declaration last month that African Americans have “nothing to lose” by voting for him.

His latest effort at outreach involved a visit to a black church in Cleveland on Wednesday, when cameras captured the Republican nominee chuckling after boxing promoter Don King used the N-word.

Mahoning, the eastern Ohio county where Miller is coordinating Trump’s campaign, is a historically Democratic stronghold that includes Youngstown, a former steel city that has experienced decades of economic decline.

The county is reputedly “ground-zero” for disaffected white, working-class Democrats who are drawn to Trump’s promise to boost manufacturing by renegotiating international free-trade agreements.

Before the primaries, some 6,000 Democrats in Mahoning switched party affiliation to Republican, reportedly to vote for Trump.



Miller, a real estate broker, said that the Democrats switching over to her party were mostly older, white voters.

She said there were “some” African Americans but played down their importance, suggesting they were only a small portion of the population and do not tend to turn out in elections in significant numbers.

African Americans constitute 16% of Mahoning county’s population, which is larger than the state and national average.

During the past two presidential elections, voter turnout in Ohio was actually higher among black people than white people.

Growing up as a kid, there was no racism, believe me. We were just all kids going to school Kathy Miller

Miller, however, suggested low turnout among black people could be connected to culture. “I don’t think that’s part of the way they’re raised,” she said. “For us, I mean, that was something we all did in our families, we all voted.”

Miller also dismissed the racial tensions of the 1960s, when she said she graduated from high school. “Growing up as a kid, there was no racism, believe me. We were just all kids going to school.”

Asked about segregation and the civil rights movement, she replied: “I never experienced it. I never saw that as anything.”

Miller added: “I don’t think there was any racism until Obama got elected. We never had problems like this ... Now, with the people with the guns, and shooting up neighborhoods, and not being responsible citizens, that’s a big change, and I think that’s the philosophy that Obama has perpetuated on America.”



Miller dismissed the suggestion that Trump was exploiting racist or prejudiced views among some voters as “the media making stuff up”. Instead, she said of the Republican nominee: “He’s very willing to talk about issues that have never been discussed publicly.”

When it was pointed out that some people might find her remarks offensive, Miller replied: “I don’t care, it’s the truth.”

