Patrick Hawley, the editor of BigLeaguepolitics.com, was alerted to the now famous photo in Governor Ralph Northam’s medical school yearbook by a former classmate who was angry over Northam’s comments earlier in the week about infanticide. From the WashingtonPost.com,
“It’s very easy to explain,” Howley, 29, said in an interview Saturday. “A concerned citizen, not a political opponent, came to us and pointed this out. I was very offended [by the photo] because I don’t like racism.”
The tip came after Northam’s comments on Wednesday about late-term abortions, he said. Howley declined to give any further information about his source, citing a confidentiality agreement. But he said it took him just a few hours to confirm that the photo was authentic.
The source of the tip appears to have been a medical school classmate or classmates of Northam who acted as a direct result of the abortion controversy that erupted earlier in the week, according to two people at Big League Politics, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
“The revelations about Ralph Northam’s racist past were absolutely driven by his medical school classmate’s anger over his recent very public support for infanticide,” one of the two said.
The tip was not driven by politics or political opportunity but by anger over Northam’s own words about infanticide.