SMALL-TOWN HATE

Dead Raccoon, Racist Threat Left at Oregon Mayor’s Office Door

Ed Fitch of Redmond made the unsettling discovery earlier this week.

A small-town mayor in Oregon found a horrific display at the door of his law office earlier this week: a racist message, taped over the corpse of a raccoon. Ed Fitch, the mayor of Redmond, discovered the twisted tableau on Monday morning, according to The Washington Post. While the exact contents of the threatening letter remain under wraps, local police said it named both Fitch and Clifford Evelyn, the town’s first-ever Black councilman, and they’re investigating it as a potential hate crime. A tourist hub nestled in the shadow of the Cascade Mountains, Redmond, population 36,000, is overwhelmingly white. Evelyn, who became a councilman in 2020, said he has experienced harassment from residents before. “It’s not unexpected for me,” he told The Washington Post.