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Slate says the new season of Slow Burn will focus on David Duke’s rise to prominence in the late 80s and early 90s. The white supremacist became an American political phenomenon. David Duke’s rise to power and prominence—his election to the Louisiana legislature, and then his campaigns for the U.S. Senate and the governorship—was an existential crisis for the state and the nation.
The fourth season of Slate’s Slow Burn will explore how a Nazi sympathizer and former Klansman fashioned himself into a mainstream figure, and why some voters came to embrace his message. It will also examine how activists, journalists, and ordinary citizens confronted Duke’s candidacy, and what it took to stop him.
Episode 1: The dirty, bizarre, unbelievably close race that resurrected David Duke’s political career. Episode 2: How Duke used the Ku Klux Klan to sell his message, and himself. Episode 3: The Republican who would stop at nothing to expose Duke, and the party that did nothing to support her. Episode 4: Duke’s campaigns got personal, tearing apart families, schools, and workplaces. Episode 5: The two men Duke fought for control of Louisiana: a colorful, crooked ex-governor and an Ivy Leaguer who took his cues from All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. Episode 6: The Race from Hell—a month inside one of the craziest, most consequential elections in American history.