Kansas Democratic Senate candidate Adam Hamilton said in a 2018 webinar that he had urged his mostly white congregation to declare “black lives matter,” a message he said prompted some members to leave his church.
“So there’s a way to say that, but even that, you know, I had people leave the church over that,” Hamilton said.
In the September 2018 webinar, Pastoring in Partisan Times, Hamilton, a liberal pastor in the United Methodist Church, discussed what he characterized as the challenges of confronting racism in rural America, recalling Confederate flags he saw while driving through the Missouri countryside.
“There are places where preaching against racism will be very hard,” Hamilton said, describing rural areas where “you see a lot of Confederate flags” and hear “interesting” things on local radio.
“And so, if I’m in those congregations, I still have to ask the question: I may have a gospel imperative about racism, but I still have to ask the question: How do I communicate that in a way that people can hear it?” he said on the webinar.
Speaking more than a year before George Floyd’s death sparked nationwide protests and riots, Hamilton explained why he had told his mostly white congregation that they needed to say black lives matter, arguing that many black people questioned whether their lives were valued.
“And the reason why we have to say black lives matter is because right now it doesn’t feel like black lives matter. The reason why we don’t have to say ‘white lives matter’ is nobody questions whether white lives matter,” Hamilton said. “But the reason why we have to say ‘black lives matter’ is because right now there’s a serious question for many black people and maybe for others as to whether black lives really matter.”
In response to an inquiry from The Daily Wire, Hamilton’s campaign said he was not calling anyone racist. The campaign said his point was about how to discuss issues with different communities and that he had previously affirmed that white lives matter and blue lives matter.
“As a pastor, Adam has practiced listening for 36 years, and this is another example of how he believes on even the hardest issues we can find common ground,” Tyson Brody, a campaign spokesperson, said in a statement to The Daily Wire. “Unlike Roger Marshall, Adam will not seek to divide Kansans by race, political party, or ability to pay a medical debt with 18% interest.”
In the same webinar, Hamilton, who described himself as theologically evangelical but socially liberal, said he strategically times his sermons on divisive issues. In a separate February 2019 church talk, he discussed his uncertainty about advising parents of young children who identify as transgender, as The Daily Wire previously reported.
“Do we give guidance? Do we not give guidance? What do we do here? And I think this comes up here [on the topic of bisexuality], and it also comes up when we think about smaller children in the question of transgender,” Hamilton said during the talk on sexual ethics.
“Trying to figure out, you know, because I have this, from time to time, with parents of smaller children, and it’s like, OK, do I leave it up to the child to completely try to think through these things, and their understanding of their identity? Or is there some role that you play in that?” Hamilton added.
Polling shows Hamilton and incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall locked in a surprisingly tight race in a state that has not sent a Democrat to the Senate since the 1930s. Republicans have shifted some financial resources to back Marshall’s re-election bid.
Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, acknowledged earlier this month that the Kansas race is tight, The Daily Wire previously reported.
“I believe that Kansas is a competitive state,” he said during a press call. “I will, however, say that as I look at all the data, it tells me that Roger Marshall will be successful, albeit closer than I want it to be.”
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