After a cease and desist order was issued by Universal Music Group and American Recordings, Stormfront Radio has stopped using Johnny Cash’s 2003 recording of “I Won’t Back Down” as its intro music. Stormfront is an internet-based white nationalist organization.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Stormfront Radio replaced Cash’s tune with Johnny Rebel’s “The South Shall Rise Again” and took down more than three years of archived shows that used Cash’s cover.
On Aug. 16, Johnny’s daughter, Rosanne Cash, released a passionate statement on Facebook denouncing the association of her father to neo-Nazism after a video surfaced that depicted a “self-proclaimed neo-Nazi” wearing a Johnny Cash t-shirt in Charlottesville, Va.
“We were alerted to a video of a young man in Charlottesville, a self-proclaimed neo-Nazi, spewing hatred and bile. He was wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with the name of Johnny Cash, our father. We were sickened by the association,” wrote Rosanne, in part, on behalf of her siblings Kathy, Cindy, Tara and John Carter.
Rosanne concluded the post with: “To any who claim supremacy over other human beings, to any who believe in racial or religious hierarchy: we are not you. Our father, as a person, icon, or symbol, is not you. We ask that the Cash name be kept far away from destructive and hateful ideology. We choose love.”
Rosanne noted on Twitter on Sept. 13 that she was “very proud we threatened legal action and got hate radio to stop using my dad’s music.”
Very proud we threatened legal action and got hate radio to stop using my dad’s music. https://t.co/qLyaDJfiWg
— rosanne cash (@rosannecash) September 13, 2017
photo of the Johnny Cash Museum exhibit by Jason Simanek
