TPM busts open the latest embarrassment for the Republican National Committee: the RNC is now touting Andrew "The Race-Baiter" Breitbart as a special guest at a fundraiser next month with Michael Steele.
Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele has a party fundraising event coming up in August that is scheduled to feature a very special guest: Conservative media activist Andrew Breitbart, according to a copy of the invitation exclusively obtained by TPM.
According to the invitation, Steele and Breitbart will appear together at a reception on Thursday, August 12 at 6:00 PM. From the invite:
Thursday, August 12:
6:00 p.m. Welcome Reception featuring Andrew Breitbart and RNC Chairman Michael Steele
The fundraiser has ambitious goals, seeking contributions as much as $60,800 per person. The minimum donation to attend the Breitbart-Steele reception is $5,000.
The RNC's decision to hold an event with Breitbart in the wake of his attempted smear of Shirley Sherrod reminds of of something Michael Steele said earlier this year:
“We have lost sight of the historic, integral link between the party and African-Americans,” Steele said. “This party was co-founded by blacks, among them Frederick Douglass. The Republican Party had a hand in forming the NAACP, and yet we have mistreated that relationship. People don’t walk away from parties. Their parties walk away from them.
“For the last 40-plus years we had a ‘Southern Strategy’ that alienated many minority voters by focusing on the white male vote in the South.”
At the time, Steele was trying to argue that the GOP needed to move past its race-baiting Southern Strategy. Just a few months later, it's clear that Steele's argument fell on deaf ears. Race-baiting is alive and well in the GOP. In fact, it's retaken center stage.
