Let's see: They've tried arguing that Kamala Harris isn't a "natural-born citizen" because her parents were both born overseas. (Harris was born in Oakland, and is therefore an American.) They've insisted that Harris isn't "an American black" (even though she's both American and black) because her black father grew up in Jamaica, not the U.S.

Although I'm sure these attacks are still being circulated by wingnuts and would-be vote suppressors, both of them have fallen flat with the general public. But the right is nothing if not persistent. Here's another one, from Patrick Howley at Big League Politics:

SLAVE REGISTERS FROM LONDON Name The Slaves Kamala Harris’ Ancestor Owned

Democrat presidential candidate Kamala Harris is descended from Irish slave owner Hamilton Brown, the namesake of Brown’s Town in Jamaica, who recruited massive numbers of Irish migrants to Jamaica to work on his sugar plantations after the British empire abolished slavery.

Kamala Harris’ father Donald Harris wrote an essay entitled “Reflections of a Jamaican Father” for Jamaica Global Online, in which he made a startling admission (emphasis added):

“My roots go back, within my lifetime, to my paternal grandmother Miss Chrishy (née Christiana Brown, descendant of Hamilton Brown who is on record as plantation and slave owner and founder of Brown’s Town) and to my maternal grandmother Miss Iris (née Iris Finegan, farmer and educator, from Aenon Town and Inverness, ancestry unknown to me)....”

Hamilton Brown was not only a slave owner, but also an engineer of mass Irish migration to Jamaica after the British empire abolished slavery in 1834.

Howley's post goes on and on, and includes a list of slaves owned by Brown. This is meant to accomplish what exactly?

If you're a black American descended from Southern slaves, you know that your genealogy could well include a slave owner, for the simple reason that rape was routine on slave plantations. It was no less true in Jamaica. Therefore, black Americans won't hold this against Harris. There's nothing "startling" about this "admission."

It was revealed in 2012 that Michelle Obama was descended from a slave owner as well as slaves. No one has turned against her for that reason.

Howley also posts this, for some reason:

Kamala Harris has never referred to herself as black? I could comb through her public statements, but it's right there in her memoir:

I was a U.S. senator-elect -- the first black woman from my state, and the second in the nation's history, to earn that job.

Why do they do this? Maybe they really believe they'll peel off jut enough voters to steal a key state. Maybe it's just hilarious to them, like those pictures of Barack Obama with a bone through his nose, but with research. Whatever the point, this attack is highly unlikely to work -- but I'm sure they'll be back with something even worse soon.

Published with permission from No More Mr. Nice Blog