#Jerry Falwell Jr. quotes Martin Luther King Jr., says he’s ‘free at last’

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Jerry Falwell Jr. and Martin Luther King Jr.
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Jerry Falwell Jr. quoted Martin Luther King Jr. on Tuesday when describing how he felt after resigning from his top university post amid a sex scandal — saying, “Thank God almighty, I’m free at last.

“It’s a relief,” Falwell told the News & Advance in Lynchburg, Va. — where, until this week, the evangelical powerhouse headed Liberty University.

“The quote that keeps going through my mind this morning is Martin Luther King Jr: ‘Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty I’m free at last.’ ”

King famously delivered the line during his historic “I Have a Dream” speech during the civil rights March on Washington in August 1963.

By comparison, Falwell, 58, was forced to resign as president of the conservative Liberty amid fallout from a statement he released Sunday saying his wife cheated on him with a Miami pool boy around 2012 and that the couple had been the victims of repeated extortion attempts since.

Falwell said the affair was brief and he was not involved.

Then the former pool boy, Giancarlo Granda, claimed that not only had the affair lasted years, but Falwell knew about it — and even watched as the illicit pair had sex. Granda denied extorting anyone.

Falwell had already been on leave from his university position when the scandal broke — over a photo of him with his arm around a pregnant woman and his pants open. He has said it was just a joke.

“I’ve done all I can do at Liberty and I’m ready to move on to something else,” Falwell told the News & Advance on Tuesday. “This happened for a reason, and the board treated me very, very generously, and I am very grateful for that.”