By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
Perhaps the most memorable events of this legislative session has been politically incorrect comments by Rep. Alvin Holmes (D) from Montgomery. Rep. Holmes attempted to clarify his position on marriage in a recent radio interview. Rep. Holmes somehow managed to include a reference to man and mule marriage in his comments.
Rep. Holmes said, “Now, I’m for interracial marriage. I’m for same-sex marriage. I’m the one that introduced the bill to have same-sex marriage. I don’t care who marry who. If a man meet a little mule and he wanna get married to the little mule, as long as he and the little mule get along all right, that’s fine with me. It doesn’t bother me any kind of way.”
Alvin Holmes gained national attention early in the 2013 legislative session when he called U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas an “Uncle Tom” and then followed that by saying that I don’t like him because he married a White woman.
Tim Lockette, with the ‘Anniston Star’ repeated the Uncle Tom comment on Twitter. It got repeated on social media and went to national sites including: ‘The National Review Online.’
Fox News then sent their reporter David Webb to interview Rep. Holmes. Holmes told Webb on camera that he stands by that statement. Rep. Holmes told Fox News, “A Black man who allows himself to carry the message of a White man in my opinion that is an Uncle Tom.” Holmes went on to tell Webb that U.S. Senator Tim Scott (R) from South Carolina was also an Uncle Tom. Fox News’s Sean Hannity put that statement on both television and radio.
In response, Holmes Black Republican opponent in the November 4 General Election, Tijuanna Adetunji, said on Facebook, “The State of Alabama has come so far. However, my opponent thinks that if a black person thinks or votes differently they are an “Uncle Tom” and that their choice is in the “interest of the white man.” I believe the true “Uncle Toms” of our day are those that work hard to silence conservative voices. Please join me as work to change the face of Alabama’s District 78.”
Holmes’s next colorful outburst occurred while the House was debating four bills to restrict abortions in the state. Holmes said on the floor of the state House: “I hate to say this but, but I’m gonna say it.” “If you ask the people in here now to raise their hands, those who are against abortion, 99% of all of the white people in here are gonna to raise their hand that they’re against abortion. On the other hand, 99% of the whites that are sitting in here now, if their daughter got pregnant by a black man, they are gonna make her, their daughter, have an abortion. They’re not gonna let her have the baby. You know the truth sometimes hurts.” “You won’t have no little black baby – she got two other white children and now she’s gonna have a little black gonna be runnin’ around there in the living room or in the den with the rest of them. You know that an I know that. You’re not gonna admit it, but you know that and I know that.”
A shocked Rep. Mary Sue McClurkin (R) from Indian Springs responded by saying that she knew a great number of white families who had adopted black children.
Holmes said, “I will bring you a hundred thousand cash dollars tomorrow if you show me a whole bunch of whites that adopting blacks in Alabama, and I’ll go down there and mortgage my house and get it cash in twenty dollar bills and bring it to you in a little briefcase.”
Some White adoptive parents of Black children have come forward to collect the bet. As of this point, Rep. Holmes has not paid on the bet.
Rep. Holmes has been in the Alabama legislature since 1974.
