Hacker group “Anonymous” claims to have released a membership list of high-powered politicians from both parties who are members of the white-supremacist Ku Klux Klan.
These names most prominently include four Republican Senators: Sens. Dan Coats (R-IN), John Cornyn (R-TX), John Hardy Isakson (R-GA), and Thom Tillis (R-NC). But the list is, overall, bipartisan: it also includes five mayors, four of whom are Democrats and one is Republican.
However, another list, released Thursday, did not include any of these elected officials.
Anonymous, without retracting their initial list, explained the Thursday list was released because they would “rather have a smaller, accurate list that we are comfortable with,” which could mean that the earlier list wasn’t completely credible.
For their part, the four Senators—along with the mayors—have denied their membership in the Ku Klux Klan.
Coats slammed the report on Twitter as “baseless Internet garbage of the worst kind.” He later wrote, “For those who are asking—I have never had any affiliation with the Ku Klux Klan and deplore all forms of racial discrimination.”
The other named Senators and mayors also slammed back, claiming that the report was absolutely false.
The Ku Klux Klan, which a century ago commanded tremendous political power in the South, now only has about 6,000 estimated members. Which makes it highly unlikely that this many politicians would be members.
