Newspaper refuses to run obituary for 87-year-old Democrat after it said ‘Trump hastened her death’ 

A Kentucky newspaper has come under fire for refusing to run the obituary for an 87-year-old woman who said President Donald Trump’s administration ‘hastened her death’.

‘If I die soon, all this Trump stuff has had an effect,’ Cathy Duff recalled her mother, Frances Irene Finley Williams, saying just six months before her death. 

Williams died just before Thanksgiving last year on November 21. 

In her obituary, she was remembered as an Elvis Presley-loving passionate Democrat, who was known for her bridge-playing talents.

And according to Duff, she didn’t mince words when it came to talking about the political climate of the United States. 

But when the family decided to add a political line at the end of Williams’ obituary, the Louisville Courier-Journal refused to run it. 

The Louisville Courier-Journal has come under fire for refusing to run the obituary for 87-year-old, Frances Irene Finley Williams (pictured with her husband), who said President Donald Trump ‘hastened her death’

But the Courier-Journal refused to publish the $1,684 obituary (pictured) with that line. The grieving family were forced to remove it, but they expressed their frustration online, prompting an apology from the newspaper

But the Courier-Journal refused to publish the $1,684 obituary (pictured) with that line. The grieving family were forced to remove it, but they expressed their frustration online, prompting an apology from the newspaper

In her obituary, she was remembered as an Elvis Presley-loving passionate Democrat, who was known for her bridge-playing talents

But her family also decided to add a political line at the end of her obituary

In Williams’ (left and right) obituary, she was remembered as an Elvis Presley-loving passionate Democrat, who was known for her bridge-playing talents. But her family also decided to add a political line at the end of her obituary

This sentence was added at the end of the obituary: ‘Her passing was hastened by her continued frustration with the Trump administration.’

Duff told The Washington Post that she added the line because she ‘felt like, along with everything else that was in there, that was a vital part of her personality and something she expressed with me over the last few months’.

‘So I felt it was important to put it in there. We never gave it any more thought than that,’ Duff added. 

But the Courier-Journal refused to publish the $1,684 obituary with that line. 

Duff and her family found out on December 24 that the obit had been rejected two days before it was supposed to run in the newspaper. 

According to the Post, the Cremation Society of Kentucky, which had been handling her mother’s obit, had received an email from a Gannett employee who said the obituary was rejected because of its ‘negative content’.

‘You are more than welcome to remove the negative content so we may move forward with publishing if you wish,’ the email read. 

The grieving family obliged and removed the line from the obituary, but Duff’s brother, Art Williams, shared the ‘disappointing’ news on Facebook. 

This sentence was added at the end of the obituary: 'Her passing was hastened by her continued frustration with the Trump administration'

This sentence was added at the end of the obituary: ‘Her passing was hastened by her continued frustration with the Trump administration’

‘I was, and still am, dumbfounded, surprised, but most of all disappointed and aghast that a once historically courageous American newspaper that exists by reason of freedom of speech would so trivially move to abate the free speech that it seems, when convenient, to hypocritically champion,’ he wrote on January 5. 

‘And over a relatively innocuous sentence. … My mom would have been offended,’ the Facebook post read. 

On January 13, Art wrote that he and his father are still waiting on an apology, one that didn’t come until Tuesday. 

Laurie Bolle, the director of sales for Gannett’s West Group, said in a Courier-Journal column that the decision to refuse the obituary was a ‘mistake’. 

She said the company does not limit what is said in obituaries ‘based on political views’. 

The Courier-Journal’s editor, Richard Green, also said in the column that ‘Mrs Williams’ obituary should have published as it was presented to our obits team and as requested by the family’.

‘In this political climate we now find ourselves, partisanship should have no role in deciding what gets included in an obituary that captures a loved one’s life — especially one as amazing as what Mrs. Williams led. 

‘I’m certain she is missed greatly by those who loved her. We send the family our deepest condolences and apologies.’

Green also personally called the family and said the Courier-Journal will be running the obituary in full.

Read more at DailyMail.co.uk