Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller made headlines again this week for posting something racist on social media.
In this particular instance, he read a Facebook post on Saturday, Nov. 9. The post accused the organizers of a Veteran’s Day parade in Stephenville, his hometown, of denying entry to a Confederate group.
When Miller saw the Facebook post he almost immediately responded: “get a rope.” After other Facebook users called Miller out for using racist slogans in relation to a group that celebrates the Confederacy, he downplayed his comment.
“Good grief people, it’s a joke,” Miller wrote. He also claimed, “get a rope” was a reference to a Pace salsa commercial.
The on-the-ground reality at the Stephenville Veteran’s Day Parade was less cut-and-dry than the Facebook post made it seem.
The Sons of Confederate Veterans were asked to take down Confederate flags in order to participate in the parade. Instead, the group decided to forgo participation altogether, according to Burton Smith, one of the parade’s coordinators.
“My understanding is that it would be inappropriate for the military to be involved in a parade with the Confederate flag flying,” Smith said.
However, Miller has never let nuance get in the way of reposting racist statements or misrepresenting the truth. Reform Austin rounded up some of Miller’s ‘greatest hits.’
From the time Miller reposted a meme calling for a nuclear attack on Muslim nations or the time he called Hillary Clinton the c-word on Twitter, it’s all here.
Miller’s predilections for the Confederacy is also well-known. In 2017, he issued a lengthy statement condemning the Six Flags amusement park company for removing the Confederate flag at its Texas location.
Sid Miller
Sam Johnson flew as a United States Air Force fighter pilot during t… he Korean War and the Vietnam War. Between the two wars he was a “Top Gun” instructor and a USAF Thunderbirds pilot.
Miller has also posted outright lies, like when he shared a photoshopped image of Whoppi Goldberg wearing an anti-Trump t-shirt.
Why Miller posted a photoshopped image instead of a real image of Goldberg in an anti-Trump shirt is anyone’s guess.
When Miller’s chief of staff Todd Smith was asked about the photo in 2018 he said that neither he nor Miller knew if the photo had been altered when it was posted on Facebook.
“We post hundreds of things a week. We put stuff out there. We’re like Fox News. We report, we let people decide,” Smith said. Apparently no one told Sid Miller that his Facebook page is like Fox News, because he said the exact opposite in 2016.
“I’m not a news source,” Miller said in an interview with KUT. “I think everyone needs to realize that Facebook is not always a reliable source if you’re wanting the factual news.”
Unfortunately, it’s highly unlikely that these will be the last false and/or racist things Sid Miller posts to his social media accounts.
