Jimmy Carter’s racist campaign of 1970
… Carter’s top campaign staffers were spotted distributing grainy photographs of Sanders arm-in-arm celebrating with two black men. Sanders was a part-owner of the Atlanta Hawks, and in the photograph he was celebrating a victory with two players who were pouring champagne over his head. Carter’s leaflet was intended to depress Sanders’s white vote.
“The Carter campaign also produced a leaflet noting that Sanders had paid tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr.”
Carter criticized Sanders, a former governor, for preventing Alabama Gov. and notorious segregationist George Wallace from speaking on Georgia state property. “I don’t think it was right for Governor Sanders to try to please a group of ultra-liberals, particularly those in Washington, when it means stifling communication with another state,” said Carter.
“‘I have no trouble pitching for Wallace votes and black votes at the same time,’ Carter told a reporter. Carter also said to another reporter, ‘I can win this election without a single black vote.