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An appointed official in the Department of Homeland Security abruptly resigned Thursday following his racist remarks about Blacks on radio, The Washington Post reported.

Rev. Jamie Johnson, the department’s head of faith-based and neighborhood partnerships, came under heavy fire for his derogatory comments. He said African Americans were to blame for having turned cities into “slums” in talk radio interviews from 2008 to as recent as last year.

“And it’s an indictment of America’s black community that has turned America’s major cities into slums because of laziness, drug use and sexual promiscuity,” Johnson said during a discussion on “The Right Balance” on Accent Radio Network in 2008.

Johnson was appointed in April by former Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly, who also recently was condemned for racially charged statements about the Civil War.

The Center for Faith-Based & Neighborhood Partnerships was formed in 2006 after Hurricanes Katrina to “engage a broader cross-section of faith and community-based organizations in all stages of the disaster sequence and provide resources for faith and community leaders to help them prepare for emergency situations,” according to its website. The center is also plays a role in the department’s fight against human trafficking.

“I have and will continue to work with leaders and members of all faiths as we jointly look to strengthen our safety and security as an interfaith community,” Johnson said in a statement to CNN. “Having witnessed leaders from the entire faith spectrum work to empower their communities I now see things much differently. I regret the manner in which those thoughts were expressed in the past, but can say unequivocally that they do not represent my views personally or professionally.”

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Homeland Security Head Says ‘Lazy’ Blacks Turned ‘Cities To Slums’  was originally published on newsone.com