This is a column I wrote this week for Deadline Detroit.

 

By Chad Selweski

Sterling Heights, the state’s fourth-largest community, four years ago endured an election for mayor and council that was plagued by homophobic, Islamophobic and racist rhetoric.

With the 2017 elections approaching next week, the tone hasn’t changed a lot in this Macomb County suburb, but the list of inflammatory subjects has grown to include candidates’ outrageous behavior on social media: postings of female nudity, foul language, strong sexual advances, and unproven claims of political corruption and Islamic schemes.

Two self-proclaimed “Christian Conservative” candidates making their second run for council continue an assault on the city’s Muslims. But this political soap opera mostly centers around a challenger for mayor, Jeff Norgrove (above, left), who has a tawdry history on Twitter and Facebook.

Norgrove, who hopes to oust incumbent Mayor Michael Taylor (above, right), has approvingly posted soft-porn photos of mostly nude women on Facebook. He has engaged in vulgar sexual conversations with a woman on Twitter. He has sparked a nasty fight with another woman on social media in which he used the word c— several times.

He also has posted items reflecting bigotry against blacks and Muslims.

In online comments about the national anthem protests at National Football League games, Norgrove referred to the NFL as the Negro Felony League. Memes he posts or “like a” portray American Muslims as terrorists and they call for the U.S. to “eradicate” Islam.

Within the political realm, the mayoral challenger claimed online long ago, without proof, that the mayor is involved “knee-deep” in the ongoing Macomb County bribery scandal, in which the FBI has linked more than a dozen officials and contractors to a corruption scheme related to trash-hauling services.  That high-profile federal probe seems to be winding down with no links to Sterling Heights.

Yet, the incumbent mayor also has engaged in his own over-the-top behavior on social media. Earlier this month, when an agitator on Facebook engaged in troll-like criticism of the Taylor administration the mayor responded:”Go to hell, Kevin. Seriously. You’re an a——.”

Continue reading here.