Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said today he is reconsidering his department's decision to fire a Georgia official in wake of new details about her controversial speech to the NAACP. Vilsack said in a statement early Wednesday morning that he will "conduct a thorough review and consider additional facts" about his decision to ask Shirley Sherrod to resign. Washington's apparent reversal came hours after a video of Sherrod's full speech was released, and the director of rural development in Georgia was defended by the white couple at the center of the controversy.
The full, uncut video of a federal agricultural official's NAACP speech purporting racial scheming, told a different story than the barely-three-minute snippet that cost Sherrod her job.
Despite admitting in the edited version of the taping that she once withheld help to the couple on the basis of race, Sherrod was defended Tuesday by the wife of a white Georgia farmer.
Sherrod, "kept us out of bankruptcy," said Eloise Spooner, 82, of Iron City in southwest Georgia. Spooner, in an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, added she considers Sherrod a "friend for life." She and her husband, Roger Spooner, approached Sherrod for help in 1986 when Sherrod worked for a nonprofit that assisted farmers.
Sherrod, who is African-American, was asked to resign Monday night by a USDA official after videotaped comments she made in March at a local NAACP banquet surfaced on the Web. Recounting her dealings with the Spooners, Sherrod said she didn't help them as much as she could because of their race.
But a review of the entire 43-minute, 15-second speech -- released Tuesday on the NAACP Web site -- showed that Sherrod was giving a cautionary tale about the evils of racial separation.
"When I made that commitment (at age 17 years old to remain in Georgia and help people), I was making that commitment to black people, and to black people only," Sherrod said nearly 15 minutes into the recording, just seconds before the segment that brought her trouble. "But you know, God will ... put things in your path so that you realize that the struggle was really about poor people."
Next, Sherrod would say the words that eventually led to her losing her job.
"[The white farmer] was trying to show me he was superior to me," she said, recalling the day some 24 years ago. "I knew what he was doing, but he had to come to me for help."
Eloise Spooner said as far as she's concerned Sherrod worked tirelessly to help the couple hold onto their land as they faced bankruptcy.
Spooner said she spoke to Sherrod by phone Tuesday morning after the story hit cable news.
"She's very sad about it," Spooner said. "She told me she was so glad we talked. I just can't believe this is happening to her."
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack issued a statement Tuesday saying the controversy made Sherrod's position as a rural development director, a job she was appointed to last March, untenable. But Vilsack said Wednesday that after learning more about what Sherrod actually said, he would reconsider.
Vilsack said in a statement early Wednesday morning that he will "conduct a thorough review and consider additional facts" about his decision to ask Sherrod to resign.
The NAACP, which had released a statement Monday critical of Sherrod, backtracked Tuesday, saying it was "snookered" by Andrew Breitbart, whose Web site biggovernment.com released the edited video. Breitbart did not respond to a request seeking comment.
"Having reviewed the full tape, spoken to Ms. Sherrod, and most importantly heard the testimony of the white farmers mentioned in this story, we now believe the organization that edited the documents did so with the intention of deceiving millions of Americans," NAACP President Ben Jealous said in a statement. "The tape of Ms. Sherrod’s speech at an NAACP banquet was deliberately edited to create a false impression of racial bias, and to create a controversy where none existed. This just shows the lengths to which extremist elements will go to discredit legitimate opposition."
In the video, Sherrod told the crowd at the NAACP banquet in Douglas, Ga., that she didn't do everything she could to help a white farmer whom she said was condescending when he came to her for aid.
"What he didn't know while he was taking all that time trying to show me he was superior to me was, I was trying to decide just how much help I was going to give him," Sherrod said on the video, recorded "I was struggling with the fact that so many black people had lost their farmland, and here I was faced with having to help a white person save their land. So I didn't give him the full force of what I could do. I did enough."
Sherrod, in her first interview after the clip surfaced, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution the video was selectively edited.
While she soon admitted as she told her story that she referred the Spooners to a white lawyer so "his own kind would help him," she followed that admission with a revelation that was omitted from the two-minute, 36-second excerpt of the speech posted by Breitbart's group.
Sherrod told the crowd that she discovered the white lawyer she had referred the Spooners to took their money for six months, but did nothing to help them.
"This lawyer told them, ‘ya'll are getting old ... why don't you just let go of the farm,'" she said. "I could not believe he said that to them."
Sherrod said she'd learned her lesson.
"It's about the poor," Sherrod said, just over 20 minutes into the speech. "It made me see it really was about those who have, versus those who don't ... black, white or Hispanic.
"It made me realize that I needed to work to help poor people ... those who don't have access the way others have."
She said the incident helped her get beyond issues of race.
"And I went on to work with many more white farmers," she said. "The story helped me realize that race is not the issue, it's about the people who have and the people who don't."
Sherrod accused the USDA of cowering to right-wing media.
"They were just looking at what the Tea Party and what Fox (News) said, and thought it was too [politically] dangerous for them," Sherrod said of her former employer.
The Sherrod video surfaced a week after the NAACP issued a resolution calling some elements of the National Tea Party racist for comments allegedly made against President Obama and African-American congressmen during the health care debate.
Sherrod said it wouldn't have made any sense for her to espouse racist comments before the NAACP audience.
"There were some white people there. The mayor [of Douglas] was there," Sherrod recalled. "Why would I do something racist if they were there?"
Douglas Mayor Jackie Wilson told the AJC she introduced speakers at the banquet but left before Sherrod's speech.
Wilson said she did not hear of any controversy in the weeks following the banquet, adding she was shocked to learn of Sherrod's resignation.
"She's not someone I know extremely well, but I respected her and thought she was doing a good job. And she seemed to be a fair person," said Wilson. "I just hate that this kind of thing happened in Douglas."
Eloise Spooner said she'll stand up for her friend.
"She helped us and we're going to help them," she said.
