Iowa crowd shouts down racist heckler who says she's "glad" Martin Luther King died


When she disrupted a breakfast honoring Martin Luther King Jr., the crowd rejected her racism and told her to "get out!"

This year's Martin Luther King Jr. Day took place in the shadow of a racist rant by a racist president, but there are signs of hope everywhere.

The new reality was illustrated perfectly at an MLK breakfast in Dubuque, Iowa, Monday morning when a racist heckler interrupted the keynote speaker and was then roundly rejected by the crowd.

Dr. Farris Muhammad, executive director of the Dubuque Multicultural Family Center, had just spoken of the ultimate price that King paid when a woman approached the dais.

"Excuse me, I'm really glad that he did die," the woman said, "because you've created a lot of racial discrimination in our country."

The crowd began to react as they realized what was going on, shouting for her to "get out" as she was escorted from the room, still ranting. In a disturbing echo of Trump's recent remarks, she shouted about Dubuque being a "shitty town" on her way out the door.

What happened next was truly heartening. Muhammad implored the crowd, "Please don't let that kill anyone's spirit this morning," adding, "We'll use that as an example, as a testimony to the work that still has to be done."

The crowd then rose to its feet in a thunderous ovation.

Trump and the Republicans have disgraced everything that King stood for, but scenes like this, repeated all across the country, give rise to the hope that Americans are using their voices to take our country back from them.