A small town Indiana resident offered an interesting take on the 2016 presidential election, or something, with a very unique float at the annual Aurora Farmers Fair.
Aurora resident Frank Linkemeyer crafted a parade float featured as part of the fair festivities on Sunday that depicted Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in an electric chair with Republican candidate Donald Trump flipping the switch, WCPO reports.
The float, pictures of which were shared online, was also adorned in Trump-Pence signs, a grim reaper, and an Easter Island-style statue of President Obama.
“It’s all in fun,” Linkemeyer told the Indianapolis Star. “Laughter is the best medicine and this country needs more laughter – and the people that are offended by it, I’m sorry. Don’t come to the parade next time.”
The event was sponsored by the Aurora Lions Club, which distanced itself from the controversial float in a statement posted online.
“The Aurora Lions Club regrets the display which was part of the Aurora Farmers Fair parade,” the statement read. “We appreciate the high levels of support and esteem given to us by our citizens. We will continue to do our best to live up to their standards.”
The City of Aurora denounced the float.
“We are disappointed that the actions of a few individuals have taken the focus away from what was otherwise a very successful 108th Aurora Farmers Fair,” a city statement read. “The city of Aurora refuses to believe that this particular float is I any way a reflection of the Aurora Lions Club or its members.”
The Dearborn County Democratic Party’s statement said the “offensive, out-of-touch float does not reflect the family friendly values of our community,” which is situated about 30 miles west of Cincinnati on the Ohio River, the Star reports.
Aurora resident Jackie Reynolds told KOCO she also believes the float reflects poorly on the community.
“For us to be in 2016 and have our president to be depicted as an Easter Island statue in blackface, which doesn’t even make sense but is just racist as can be,” she said.
Resident Tony Moore said he doesn’t see the humor in the float because he’s “raising a daughter in this town and I’m trying to teach her to respect everyone, and to treat people like she would like to be treated.”
Penny Britton, a purple haired young lady at the parade, said the controversial float made her physically ill.
“It instantly turned my stomach,” she said. “One of the pictures shows children seeing the float go by, and staring at it.”
Other older residents didn’t see the harm.
“I thought it was funny, I really did,” Maurine Baker said. “Personally, I was not offended.”
Linkemeyer, meanwhile, is adamant the float was not designed to offend or make a political statement.
“I could have taken and put Donald Trump in that (electric chair) and had Hillary pull the handle,” he said. “Nevertheless, I would never have pleased everybody and it definitely was all for laughter.”
The Farmers Fair float follows a similarly “offensive” float in Amarillo, Texas by a group called Stars and Bars during the area’s Tri-State Parade in September. That float, featured Obama caged in a makeshift jail with Hillary Clinton, along with a man wearing a Make America Great Again flag as a cape and American flags streaming from the tow truck, KXXV reports.
The float, which was accompanied by the Confederate Riders of America, drew the ire of “a lot of people in the black and Hispanic community,” as well as the NAACP for allegedly racist connotations, locals told the news site.
Several months prior, for Anderson, Indiana’s Fourth of July parade, 73-year-old Sheridan resident Don Christy was also labeled a racist for a golf cart float with a stuffed lion on the front with a sign that read “African Lion,” and a depiction of Obama on a toilet on the back with the signs “Royal Flush” and “Lying African,” the Star reports.
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