The husband and friends of an Oklahoma mayor, donned in Ku Klux Klan robes for Halloween, are not actual Klansmen. Nope, just "four good ol’ boys sitting around drinking [until] things got out of control." Of course.
You know who else apparently aren’t actual Klansmen? Many of the government officials named yesterday by an Anonymous affiliate group during what many believed to be the latest moves from the hacktivist group’s #OpKKK campaign.
Anonymous announced last week that #OpKKK, the operation by which it pledged to publically reveal the identities of up to 1,000 KKK members, would coincide with the anniversary of Michael Brown’s death at the hands of Darren Wilson and the subsequent iconic protests in Ferguson. On Sunday and Monday, four posts originally attributed to Anonymous went up on text-sharing site Pastebin—the same site which Anonymous used to announce their operation last week. The posts listed the e-mail addresses and phone numbers of alleged active KKK members, as well as nine politicians (four senators and five city mayors) with suspected membership.
Anonymous hopped on Twitter to distance itself from the list, saying that it was not responsible for it and did not verify the information on it.
This account has NOT YET released any information. We believe in due diligence and will NOT recklessly involve innocent individuals #OpKKK
— Operation KKK (@Operation_KKK) November 2, 2015
We respect the work of our fellow freedom fighters. However, we are unable to confirm, deny or take credit for any work that we did not do.
— Operation KKK (@Operation_KKK) November 2, 2015
#ICYMI #OpKKK was in no way involved with today’s release of information that incorrectly outed several politicians https://t.co/M1ltrb2P0B
— Operation KKK (@Operation_KKK) November 2, 2015
The last of the three tweets above links to another tweet by the person claiming to be responsible for the lists, saying that he’s not an Anonymous member, but an #OpKKK supporter.
@Amoswtlcindy Amos, completely false. I have never had any affiliation with the Ku Klux Klan and deplore all forms of discrimination
— Senator Dan Coats (@SenDanCoats) November 2, 2015
Anonymous plans to enact the next stages of #OpKKK tomorrow and Thursday.