Land says Obama used Martin case for politics

A top Southern Baptist official has accused President Obama and black civil rights activists of using the Trayvon Martin shooting to foment racial strife and boost the president’s reelection chances.

“Rather than holding rallies on these issues, the civil rights leadership focuses on racially polarizing cases to generate media attention and to mobilize black voter turnout,” Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission and the denomination’s top public policy official, said on his radio program March 31.

“This is being done to try to gin up the black vote for an African-American president who is in deep, deep, deep trouble for reelection and who knows that he cannot win reelection without getting the 95 percent of blacks who voted for him in 2008 to come back out and show they are going to vote for him again.” Land’s remarks were first reported April 2 by the Associated Baptist Press.