An Alabama town's first Black mayor can finally take office — four years after his election and the all-white city council locking him out.
Patrick Braxton was elected in 2020 as the only candidate qualified to run for the non-partisan position of mayor in Newbern, a majority-Black town of 133 people about 40 miles west of Selma.
But he was prevented from exercising his duties by the white incumbent mayor until reaching a settlement last week as part of a civil rights lawsuit, reported WVUA-TV.
Newbern hasn't held an election in its 170-year history, and town officials are instead "hand-me-down" positions – and the mayor has traditionally appointed a successor who then appoints council members.
The 57-year-old Braxton ran unopposed and was the only candidate to file the necessary paperwork to run for any of the municipal positions, so he became mayor-elect by default in June 2020 – two months ahead of the scheduled election – without any votes being cast.
An analysis by the Southern Poverty Law Center determined Braxton, who's a contractor and volunteer fireman, was the only candidate in the town's history to officially qualify for any municipal office in Newbern.
Braxton then appointed the town's first majority-Black council after his election, like other mayors had in the past, but incumbent mayor Haywood Stokes III, who got the title from his father in 2008, and other outgoing officials changed the locks on the town hall and refused to give him access to town bank accounts, according to the suit.
The outgoing council then held a secret meeting and called for a special election in October 2020 without notifying Braxton or the Black council members he appointed, the suit alleges, and the all-white council was then declared the winner, although none of them had officially qualified to run.
The mayor-elect refused to meet with the white council to avoid lending it legitimacy, so they declared the mayor's office vacant and named Stokes as interim mayor.
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Braxton reached a settlement June 21 in the lawsuit, which was scheduled to go to trial in September, that immediately reinstates him as mayor-elect and gives him access to town hall.
Stokes and any other “individuals holding themselves out as town officials will effectively resign and/or cease all responsibilities with respect to serving in any town position or maintaining any town property or accounts," according to the proposal.
Braxton will submit names for city council positions to Republican Gov. Kay Ivey to appoint, and if those appointments aren't made a special election will be held.
Alabama law requires municipal elections in odd-numbered years, and Newbern is pledged to hold a free and fair election next year.