West York, Pennsylvania Mayor Charles Wasko (Classmates.com)
A Pennsylvania mayor is facing calls for resignation after he spent months posting racist messages about President Barack Obama.
Charles Wasko – who has been mayor of West York, Pennsylvania since 2013 – compared Obama and his family to monkeys on Facebook. He also posted an image urging the president to hang himself.
And according to the York Dispatch, four officials – half Republican and half Democrat – have taken issue with it.
Two images depict Obama’s wife and children as primates. The first, posted in February, saw Wasko change his profile picture to a teeth-baring chimpanzee.
“Most think it is Obama’s picture……sorry its [sic] Moochelles baby photo,” the mayor wrote, referring to Michelle Obama.
Another image from June meant to depict the entire Obama family features a wheelbarrow full of baby orangutans.
“Aww… moving day at the White House has finally arrived,” said a caption on the photo.
Wasko added, “not soon enough!”
In a more sinister post from February, Wasko shared a picture of actor-director Clint Eastwood under a noose.
“Barry, this rope is for you. You wanna bring that empty chair over here!” the image’s caption read.
Phillip Hied responded more nooses were needed for other politicians like Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton, whom Hied nicknamed “Killary.”
Then, an August post saw Wasko sharing a hypothetical story about a Black child asking his mother about socialism and racism.
The mother then launches into a stereotypical list of “governmental entitlement stuff” like public assistance programs.
When the child asked the mother if those things make “the white people get pissed off,” she responded, “Sure they do, Honey. That’s called Racism.”
Because of the racist imagery and messages, several West York borough council members are asking Wasko to step down.
“Absolutely deplorable,” council President Shawn Mauck told PennLive. “It makes you sick. There’s no good excuse for his actions or behavior.”
Since the borough council cannot force a mayor to resign, the group is moving for a censure vote on Oct. 6.
Additionally, Councilman Brian T. Wilson posted on Facebook that he asked Wasko to remove the offending messages.
However, Wasko ended up blocking Wilson instead of deleting them.
Wilson will ask the mayor to resign at a meeting Oct. 3.
Wasko has not responded to the matter on his Facebook page. But when contacted by York Daily, he said it’s just “b——- that’s going on up at the borough office” before promptly hanging up.
