Iowa Students Wearing KKK Hoods In Social Media Photo Face Disciplinary Action

CRESTON, IA — Five southern Iowa teenagers face disciplinary action after a photo of them dressed in Ku Klux Klan robes with what appeared to be a burning cross circulated on social media. Officials at Creston Community High School didn’t reveal the nature of the disciplinary action or the names of the students involved, noting all are all minors, but said the matter was dealt with swiftly when school officials became aware of it.

One of the students pictured is holding a Confederate flag, and another one appeared to be holding a firearm, according to media reports. The photo was not taken on school property, prompting questions about whether the disciplinary action violates the students’ First Amendment free-speech rights. (Iowa Patch is coming back. Find your local Iowa Patch here and sign up for real-time news alerts and free morning newsletters.)

The photo surfaced amid a raging national debate over the fate of hundreds of Civil War monuments and the Confederate flag itself, defended as a symbol of Southern pride but criticized as an emblem of racism and oppression. Last month, a counter-protester was killed in Charlottesville, Virginia, in a clash with KKK members, neo-Nazis and other white supremacists rallying to protest the planned removal of Confederate monuments.

The Creston police chief told the Des Moines Register it doesn’t appear the students broke any laws, but the school’s athletic director and assistant high school principal, Jeff Bevins, told the newspaper the Klan imagery in the photo “does not represent the beliefs of our school system, our parents or our community.”

Several students condemned the photo, including Austin Bloyd, who told KCCI-TV that some of his friends were involved. Bloyd, who is black, said he hopes it was “a bad joke” but admitted to being confused and shaken up.

“Some of these guys are my friends,” he told the television station. “I didn’t really think they thought that way.”

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School officials said they would be speaking with students who “were obviously upset by the photo” in the coming days. “This certainly isn’t an issue that you forget and move on,” high school Principal Bill Messerole told the Register.

Robert Smallwood, an African-American with a biracial son on the high school football team, told the Omaha World-Herald the incident may never have happened if schools did a better job teaching about the horrors of slavery, the Klan’s post-Civil War raids against newly emancipated slaves and the Jim Crow era.

His wife, Danielle Smallwood, who is white, was dismayed to see the photo surface in her hometown.

“I don’t think people understand history can repeat itself, and that seems to be what it’s doing,” she told the World-Herald. “This happened in our small town. It just really brings that home.”

Betty Andrews, the president of the NAACP for Iowa and Nebraska, said she was “floored” and “really disturbed” by the photo but has seen an increase in hate speech in Iowa, which she called an imperative for more education on race issues.

“It’s a pretty horrific sight to see in Iowa,” Andrews told the Register. “I do see complaints of this nature, and it’s not only happening in Creston.”

Mark Kende, the director of the Constitutional Law Center at Drake University in Des Moines, told the Register he thinks school disciplinary action is “a serious free speech issue” because the incident didn’t occur on school grounds and was not targeted at specific individuals.

Iowa soldiers fought for the Union in Civil War, sending more soldiers per capita than any other state.

AP Photo/John Bazemore: File