Willie Horton

For the former professional baseball player, see Willie Horton (baseball). For other persons named William Horton, see William Horton (disambiguation).

William Horton
Born
William R. Horton

(1951-08-12) August 12, 1951 (age 73)
Chesterfield, South Carolina, U.S.
Criminal statusIncarcerated
Conviction(s)First degree murder, armed robbery, rape, assault
Criminal penaltyLife imprisonment without the possibility of parole
Imprisoned atJessup Correctional Institution
Jessup, Maryland, U.S.

William R. Horton (born August 12, 1951), commonly referred to as "Willie Horton", is an American convicted murderer who was the subject of a major political controversy in the 1988 presidential election. Horton had committed violent crimes while on furlough from prison, where he was serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole for murder.[1] Released for a weekend as the beneficiary of a Massachusetts furlough program, he failed to return, and was later recaptured and convicted of committing assault, armed robbery, and rape in Maryland, where he remains incarcerated.

During the 1988 presidential election, US Vice President and Republican nominee George H. W. Bush brought Horton up frequently during his campaign against Democratic nominee Michael Dukakis who was the governor of Massachusetts. He was commonly referred to as "Willie" Horton, despite never having gone by the nickname. The renaming of the African-American Horton has been speculated to be the product of racist stereotyping.[2] A prominent PAC ad for Bush about Horton has been widely characterized as a textbook example of dog-whistle politics.[3][4][5][6][7]

  1. ^ "Prison furloughs survive campaign flap over Willie Horton". Milwaukee Journal. Associated Press. November 6, 1989.[permanent dead link]
  2. ^ Newton, Adam Zachary (1995). Narrative Ethics. Harvard University Press. p. 324. ISBN 9780674600874.
  3. ^ Haney-Lopez, Ian (2013). Dog whistle politics: how coded racial appeals have reinvented racism and wrecked the middle class. Oxford University Press. p. 106. ISBN 978-0-19-022925-2. OCLC 908967433.
  4. ^ Withers, Rachel (December 1, 2018). "George H.W. Bush's "Willie Horton" ad will always be the reference point for dog-whistle racism". Vox. Retrieved June 11, 2020.
  5. ^ Criss, Doug (November 1, 2018). "This is the 30-year-old Willie Horton ad everybody is talking about today". CNN. Retrieved June 11, 2020.
  6. ^ Baker, Peter (December 3, 2018). "Bush Made Willie Horton an Issue in 1988, and the Racial Scars Are Still Fresh". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved June 11, 2020.
  7. ^ Scott, Eugene (December 3, 2018). "How the Willie Horton ad factors into George H.W. Bush's legacy". The Washington Post.