Racism In America: Warren Mayor Jim Fouts Calls Black People Chimps, Old Women Hags In Michigan Scandal, Foes Claim

An audio recording that allegedly shows a Michigan mayor calling black people chimpanzees has stirred controversy. The alleged recordings of Warren Mayor Jim Fouts making derogatory comments were released Monday by Motor City Muckraker, an independent news organization.

The site did not explain how it obtained the brief recordings. In the four audio clips, a voice, which is believed to be Fouts, made numerous disparaging comments about black people and older women.

"Blacks do look like chimpanzees, I was watching this black woman with her daughter and they looked like two chimps. Their mouths were elongated up, duck-ish like," the voice can be heard saying. “I remember this one kid in my class, I told you some years ago he said – we were at a party store – he says my dad had rules: only two N****** at a time,” another recording said.

The 74-year-old mayor can also allegedly be heard saying he does not want to date older women. “Think I want to date a fucking 60-year-old hag?” the voice says. “Fuck that shit. I’m not interested in any old ugly hag. I think after a certain age they are dried up, washed up burned out. They are p------ when they are young, and when they get older, they’re just mean, hateful dried-up c----.”

Listen to all of the recordings here.

Some residents and at least one law enforcement official in a nearby community have since called for Fouts' resignation. "I just listened to the recordings of Mayor Fouts. While I am not a member of the Warren community, I am a member of the human community. You need to go," wrote Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard in a Facebook post Monday.

Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan also said Fouts should resign if the allegations are found to be true.

Fouts, who marked Martin Luther King Jr. Day Monday by attending local events, said the audio clips are not of him. Instead, he claimed they were falsified by his political foe, Macomb County Executive Mark Hackel, he said.

"Just attended what should have been a joyous occasion for our 4th annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. ceremony. Instead Mark Hackel and friends attempted to hijack this ceremony by releasing more vile, vitriolic, phony tapes against me," Fouts said on his Facebook page Monday.

Hackel told news reports last month that he was sent the recordings from the friend of the Warren city employee who recorded the conversation. He said he does not know the identity of the employee, according to reports.

“They asked me to pass it along to a news reporter,” Hackel said. “After I listened to it, I couldn’t believe (what I heard) so I passed it along. If I don’t (pass it on), there would be questions of why I was sitting on it. I thought if I didn’t do it, what if I was being tested here.”

Hackel said the mayor should discuss the allegations with the unnamed source of the recordings. “He’s going to have to challenge the source of the information, and that’s the employee who was in the room with him,” Hackel said.

This isn't the first time Fouts has been in trouble for his alleged remarks. Previous audio recordings of Fouts that were released last month portrayed him as critical of mentally disabled people. He said they “aren’t even human beings," according to the audio.

The remarks saw him fired from his weekly radio show on 910AM Radio Superstation.

About 135,358 people live in Warren, which is about 78 percent white and 13 percent black.