- Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt is calling for the resignation of county officials over racist comments.
- In a recording, officials in McCurtain County discussed lynching Black people and killing journalists.
Calls are growing for the resignation of a group of Oklahoma county officials who appear to have been caught on tape discussing lynching Black people and musing about the killing of journalists, according to a local newspaper's report.
The comments, captured by a device left in the county commissioners' office on March 6, were originally reported on by the local McCurtain Gazette. Bruce Willingham, the publisher of the Gazette, captured the audio after leaving his recording device inside a McCurtain County commissioners' meeting, in an attempt to prove the officials were conducting county business in closed-door meetings in violation of the state's Open Meeting Act.
Before he placed the recording device, "I talked on two different occasions to our attorneys to make sure I wasn't doing anything illegal," Willingham told the Associated Press.
Instead of an illegal meeting, Willingham appears to have captured disparaging remarks about Black people, the press — and specifically, his own son. Chris Willingham, Bruce's son and a reporter at the paper, was referenced on the tape as a subject of the officials' ire, per the Gazette reporting.
On Monday, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the office of McCurtain County Sheriff Kevin Clardy to demand his resignation, local news outlet KSLA reported. Clardy, according to the Gazette, appeared on the recording released over the weekend along with county Commissioner Mark Jennings and others.
The remarks prompted Oklahoma's Gov. Kevin Stitt to issue a statement Sunday night calling for their resignation. "There is simply no place for such hateful rhetoric in the state of Oklahoma," he said, according to ABC News.
Representatives for Jennings and Stitt did not immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment. Representatives for the McCurtain County Sheriff's Department declined to comment on the matter.
In excerpts of the recording, voices that the Gazette report claims belong to the officials can be heard lamenting racial progress and the reporters' journalism.
A voice identified by the Gazette as Jennings can be heard saying, you used to be able to just "take a damn Black guy and whoop their ass" — or "hang them up with a damn rope." But, he continued, "you can't do that anymore. They got more rights then we got."
The voice that the Gazette reports belongs to Jennings would go on to boast of knowing "two or three hit men" over in Louisiana who would show "no fucking mercy," a fact he brought up in a conversation about the Willinghams, who had been causing them trouble with their tough coverage.
In response, the voice the Gazette identifies as Sheriff Clardy said of the reporters that "what goes around goes around," before the voice apparently belonging to Jennings then added: "I know where two big deep holes are here if you ever need them."
The comments came the same day that one of the reporters filed a lawsuit against the men for "slander," NBC News reported. Kilpatrick Townsend, the law firm representing the reporters, released a statement saying that they have been targeted for doing their jobs.
"For nearly a year, they have suffered intimidation, ridicule, and harassment based solely on their efforts to report the news for McCurtain County," NBC News reported the firm's statement read.