(UPDATED - adds McCain spokesman comment)
KANSAS CITY - Missouri voter Mary Kay Green has had enough.
The supporter of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama filed a lawsuit this week over what she claims is dangerous “hate speech” coming from the rival campaign of Republican presidential nominee John McCain.
Green, a 66-year-old grandmother and “semi-retired” civil rights attorney, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Kansas City this week accusing McCain, his running mate Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and their campaign manager Rick Davis of “intentionally, recklessly and irresponsibly” portraying Obama “as un-American, a terrorist by association, and ‘not like us,’ a non-white individual.”
Palin, Green alleges in her lawsuit, has at her rallies used false statements to work supporters “into a frenzy causing them to make death threats” against Obama.
The lawsuit claims that Green “suffers terror of the heart, anxiety and grave fear for the life of Presidential candidate and U.S. Senator Barack Obama” because of the McCain campaign’s efforts to invoke hatred against Obama.
A McCain spokesman said the charges were without merit.
“It’s a great country — anyone can file a lawsuit anytime on any matter, whether it has merit or not,” said McCain spokesman Brian Rogers. “As Sen. McCain explained in detail in last night’s debate, charges like this have no merit. He will compare his record of setting the record straight to any of his overzealous or inappropriate supporters against Sen. Obama’s any day.”
Green is seeking damages of $6 million, “and prays that they cease and desist their reprehensible campaigning.” She told Reuters that she will not drop the lawsuit unless McCain’s camp repudiates the death threats and tones down the rhetoric.
“It is a federal crime to threaten the life or a presidential candidate … they are participating in that crime,” Green said.
Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage.
- Photo credit: Reuters/Carlos Barria (McCain at a rally in Pennsylvania on Thursday)

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More proof that democrats and other leftists only value speech when it aligns with their thoughts, beliefs and doctrines. The real fascists are those who wish to use the law to constrain those with whom they disagree from expressing their opinions, usually labeling them as “hate speech,” a term not found in the First Amendment. Get ready to bend over America, because Comrade Obama and his socialist friends in the “Democratic” Party have censorship in store for you, for your own good, the good of the country, and for the children. Stalin would be proud.
Too bad fooling a majority of the foolish is the criteria for getting elected and is considered by these same idiots as being tantamount to legitimacy. America deserves Obama.
- Posted by Iosef D.I can’t believe you are reporting on this lawsuit, but not a peep about Berg v. Obama.
- Posted by PaigeWhy is she suing? Shouldn’t Obama be suing McCain’s camp since he is the target of the hate speech? He’s the victim not her.
- Posted by iafrateHurray for her! I think her case is a good one because I too fear for Mr. Obama’s life especially since Mrs. Palin seems to be intent on spreading the lies. At least Mr. McCain has actually spoken up on occasion. Yet he allows Palin to continue this race baiting and hate mongering speech.
- Posted by Raven IvanovMary Kay is correct in asking for accountability from the McCain and Palin campaign. I watched the rallies on TV and U-tube and I was sickened… It was like watching a KKK rally. If there is no validity to the accusations, than why did they both back peddle last week to defend Senator Obama against the very rhetoric they have been perpetuating? What irony. Ignorance, fear and hate are being served up on a big heaping platter for all of America right now and its being gobbled up by the folks calling themselves conservative Christians. Wouldn’t Jesus be impressed?
- Posted by Dieting in KCPalin’s hate speech is so over the top that it belongs in Nazi Germany…NOT the USA! She is a hate monger, GOP pitbull and represents everything that this country should stand against. Shame on you McCain for letting this go on…you have a career to protect, she on the other hand will go back to Alaska (if they still want her) and hopefully never get elected to anything more important than Trash Pickup!
- Posted by Karen SicardI do appologize to Lenore Annenberg. Walter passed away in 2002. I did not intend to make my statement sound that Walter supports Mccain when it is only Lenore that supports him.
- Posted by MPBOk everyone I am absolutley sick and tired of this “Obama convorts with terrorists like Ayers” statement. Yes Obama has met Ayers. He met him at the Chicago Annenberg Challenge which was sponsered by Walter and Lenore Annenberg to the tune of 50 MILLION dollars. Oh you dont know who they are?? They just so happen to be top Mccain supporters. So by the same logic that people are saying that Obama convorts with terrorists then the statement “Mccain recieves money from terrorist supporters” is then correct.
- Posted by MPBA civil rights lawyer who is against free speech. How novel. Shouldn’t she be called an anti-civil rights lawyer?
- Posted by JoeMary Kay Green, the lawyer who has filed this disgraceful suit wrote the following in the above comments, “(o)nce Senator McCain makes this statement and his running mate Sarah Palin as well, I will dismiss my lawsuit. But he must make a specific statement calling these death threats abhorant to him and Sarah Palin and that they will not be tolerated at their rallies.” For starters, no less than the Secret Service has already come out and said that there have been NO “death threats” made at McCain or Palin rallies. Further what makes Ms. Green believe that she can end the right to political free speech, the most protected speech in this nation? As Dean Wormer said in the movie Animal House, “Seven years of college, down the drain.”
- Posted by EL RiderNow let me get this straight, some facsist’s rights lawyer from Missouri has decided to sue John McCain and Sarah Palin using some Obama campaign talking points and some Obama campaign lies as the basis for a lawsuit that mocks the First Ammendment of the United States Constitution. Add to that the fact that some of the selfish Democrats in our midst believe that throwing free speech in the trash in order to help their chosen candidate is the right and proper thing to do. Let me be clear, when your candidate inspires you to deny the right of political free speech to others you need serious phychological help. It is likely far too late for Ms. Green but others should heed that advice, get thee to a doctor!
- Posted by EL RiderMs. Green should be disbared. She is a disgrace to a disgraceful profession.
- Posted by Sundance 44Know what 10,000 lawyers on the bottom of the Ocean are?
..a good beginning!
Note to Ms. Green:
Get a life!
Ms. Green, I think what you have done is a brave thing and it isn’t about the money but about the moral issue of not going and rallying people up to become mobs. It’s mob mentality like this which has caused people to die for no reason other than the person was ‘different’ in some way. It’s also supporting prejudice because these people who attend and are so vocal with hate at these rallies do not -research- and use their brains. They are followers who want a fight.
- Posted by ZarthusPalin seems the most hostile and I wish she’d just go home. Ever since she came on the campaign trail with less experience than anyone else, she has only stirred up trouble with her big mouth and she’s the last person to mention Rev. Wright, Ayers, or justice considering she associated with a preacher who did crimes in Africa and is far worse in demeanor and bigotry, she supports the organization to help Alaska ’succeed’ from the U.S. and the guy who leads it is pretty well close to being a terrorist and he’s an adult -doing- the deeds still and she also has fired someone who only a month earlier she highly praised because he wouldn’t fire a trooper in a dispute. Yet I note that Obama has been polite even when he could have said the worst about that woman and at least admitted she’s hardly worthy of being a heartbeat away from presidency. Keep up the good fight and if you do lose, it was still worth a try. After all, all you are asking for is for McCain and Palin to call the acts abhorrent, which they are.
Green’s lawsuit is NOT about money: it’s about urging McCain/Palin to act RESPONSIBLY. If Obama-supporters were calling for McCain or Palin to be MURDERED, the same people dismissing Green’s stand would HOWL IN OUTRAGE. The longtime “lynch-mob mentality” of some white people is echoing today–and THAT’S THE REAL DANGER in this capaign season.
- Posted by Lydia HowellOne would think that white working-class people who are lsoing jobs.losign homes, having their kids fight in endless UN-necesasruy wars would ahve had enough by now…but, just raise the flag of white supremacy & racism & these idiots go for it every time.
END THE HATE. WAKE UP. The right-wing is destorying this country (while babbling religous platittudes they do NOT live) all innthe service of the REAL: elititists: Corproate Greedh3ads who just ripped you off for $750 BILLION. The problem ain’t Black people! It’s the TOP 5% wealthy stealing from all the rest of us.
The words of Vice President Henry Wallace in 1944:
“The really dangerous American fascist is the man who wants to do in the United States in an American way what Hitler did in Germany in a Prussian way. The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power.
They claim to be super patriots, but they would destroy every liberty guaranteed by the Constitution. They demand free enterprise but are spokesman for monopoly and vested interest. Their final objective toward which all their deceit is directed is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjugation.”
- Posted by seeger carbajalThe hate speech and threats are real, the incitement by Ms. Palin is real; it is on video. The overuse of the legal system via lawsuits is also real. In their own ways both things reflect the worst in us. While overt inflammatory speech which clearly incites violent intent must not go unchecked, Ms. Green’s course of action will likely do her cause more harm than good. The backlash against Palin’s behavior has already done more to moderate the situation than a lawsuit ever will. In the meantime we can expect backlash against the lawsuit.
So much wasted energy. I for one am looking forward to more grown up times. It will take a long while from the look of things. However, as an independent I invite everyone to question just how well either of our two major parties represent us, and how much we really benefit from a two-party system. Both candidates talk about the need for major change. Once we break away from a system that gives power to a 51% “majority” we might really see one.
- Posted by RynoNeighbors in my suburb who support Barack Obama are afraid to put campaign signs in their yard because they fear repercussions from some nutcase being stirred up by the McCain/Palin campaign. This is reprehensible, America, and is turning our progress on race issues back to the dark ages. The McCain campaign (in concert with its mouthpiece Fox News) is fully aware of what its doing with the inflammatory line “palling around with terrorists.” They are trying to tie Obama to the Muslim extremists that attacked us on 9-11. McCain himself says he doesn’t care about Bill Ayres, dismissing him as some “dried up old hippie.” So if you don’t care about some dried up old hippie, Senator, what’s your justification for keeping up the drum beat against Obama for “palling around with terrorists.” Don’t think for a moment that the McCain campaign is backing off of this tactic — they are just going undergound with it now, using robocalling in swing states with their fear-mongering. McCain is a weasel of the worst sort for condemning in public the very behavior his campaign tactics are designed to elicit.
- Posted by McCartney BarnesAs a shot across the bow of the excrementally inclined Sarah Palin and her methuselah runnign mate, I think Mrs Green has done the right thing. It’s a test case for those who are appalled by the vile rhetoric of the morally bankrupt.
That so many poisonous bugs and biting insects have crawled out of the woodwork to assail Obama and back-up the McCain raving monster party, is interesting yet thoroughly informing. Like the scorpion, they sting because that’s what they do. It is the nature of the racist and hate-mongers that they support the disgraceful, disgusting and reprehensible claptrap that has come out of the mouths of a group of people who loath other people who have different skin colors.
I rest my case…
- Posted by TheTruthIs...If Green wins, the amount may be re-adjusted to $6, minus attourney fees = -$9994. However, if there is justice in the American heart, McCain will lose the race for losing his head, leaving Green in the red, and the country in the clear.
- Posted by J.K.I’m just a middle class 50 year old white woman who wonders how anyone who has listened to any news at all can honestly think Barack Obama is a terrorist or not a Christian man. It is a sad time to me that this country is still so ignorant. I grew up in a community with 2 black people in the entire community. There was NO diversity and yet I have grown to realize that exposing myself to the diversity of this country has helped enable me to grow to be the person I am today.
To all of you who are making excuses for the ignorance of others, are you the ones who put white sheets over your heads and burned crosses? Maybe we should go back to the days of slavery and make a law that if you have a name that is different, if your skin is a different color than white, if you have a slang or an accent you should be burned at the stake. NO ONE should tolerate the cries of hatred! Shame on ALL the people at the McCain/Palin rallies. They all should have turned on the offenders.
- Posted by Candi