Racist text message sent to Black people after election expands to Latinos, LGBTQ

Nathaniel Smith was having dinner with his 24-year-old niece when her phone buzzed with a text message.

It buzzes all day, but this time, something was different.

“She said, ‘Look what I got,’ and showed it to me,” said Smith, the founder and CEO of the Partnership for Southern Equity, an Atlanta nonprofit.

The message said she had “been selected to be a house slave at the nearest plantation. Be ready at 8 a.m. sharp on Monday.”

Smith’s niece is one of dozens, perhaps hundreds, of most young Black people across the country who reported receiving racist text messages in the wake of the Nov. 5 election. Many were college students.

The text messages have since continued, according to the FBI. The agency said Friday that the recipients have now expanded to high school students, as well as the Latino and LGBTQ+ communities. Some of these recipients said they were told to join a reeducation camp or were selected for deportation, according to the Friday news release.

“Although we have not received reports of violent acts stemming from these offensive messages, we are evaluating all reported incidents and engaging with the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division,” the FBI said. “We are also sharing information with our law enforcement partners and community, academia, and faith leaders.”

There have also been emails communicating similar messages, the FBI said.

“I feel that historically, people who don’t want Black people to be free have utilized fear to control our emotions about our commitment to being free,” said Smith, who posted a screen shot of his niece’s text on Facebook. “This is horrible and my prayer is that incidents like this won’t increase as a result of Trump’s election.”

The Southern Poverty Law Center said it was investigating the messages received by students in Alabama and Georgia, according to a Nov. 7 news release. The NAACP said that messages were received in nine states, The New York Times reported.

NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson said the alarming text messages are the result of “electing a president who, historically has embraced, and at times encouraged hate.”

“These messages represent an alarming increase in vile and abhorrent rhetoric from racist groups across the country, who now feel emboldened to spread hate and stoke the flames of fear that many of us are feeling after (the) election results,” he said in a statement. “These actions are not normal. And we refuse to let them be normalized.”

Many of the text messages say the recipient has been selected to pick cotton on a plantation, according to the FBI. Another message was reported saying that the recipient had been selected to become a slave on Jan. 21, the day after the presidential inauguration.

“The text sent to young Black people, including students at Alabama State University and the University of Alabama, is a public spectacle of hatred and racism that makes a mockery of our civil rights history,” said Margaret Huang, SPLC president and CEO. “Hate speech has no place in the South or in our nation.”

Students began receiving the text messages on Nov. 6, the day after the election. Early that morning, The Associated Press declared Donald Trump the winner of the presidential election, capping off several contentious months of campaigning. Exit polls showed that 13% of Black voters cast their ballots for Trump in the election, the lowest percentage among any racial demographic group.

The GBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday afternoon.

Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr said his office is also aware of the texts. Carr said in a statement to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “This behavior is vile, and I condemn it in the strongest possible terms. Anyone threatened should immediately contact their local law enforcement agency.”

While many of the people who’ve reported receiving the messages are college students, some are younger. A 13-year-old DeKalb County student received a message saying he was going to be a slave and pick cotton, according to Channel 2 Action News.

Students at Clemson University and the University of South Carolina also have reported receiving similar messages, the Greenville News reported. Clemson police are investigating, and the University of South Carolina is coordinating with state and federal law enforcement agencies, the news outlet reported.

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(This story has been updated from a previously published article on Nov. 8.)

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