The FBI investigates racist messages sent to black people across the United States
Authorities are investigating racist messages sent to black Americans across the country, telling them to report to a “cotton picking” plantation.
Black Americans, including schoolchildren and college students, are among the recipients in states including Alabama, North Carolina, Virginia, New York and Pennsylvania.
“The FBI is aware of offensive and racist text messages sent to individuals across the country and is in contact with the Department of Justice and other federal agencies regarding this problem”.
The messages appear to have begun on Wednesday, the day after election day. Some of the messages referred to Trump’s campaign, which has strongly denied any connection.
“This campaign has absolutely nothing to do with these messages,” said Steven Cheung, a spokesman for the campaign.
The origin of the anonymous messages and the total number of messages sent remain unclear.
A 42-year-old mother in Indiana sent copies of text messages her high school daughter received to the BBC.
The messages said the daughter had been “selected to be a slave at your nearest plantation” and would be “picked up in a white van” and “thoroughly searched when you reach your destination”.
The woman, who asked to remain anonymous for her safety, called the messages “extremely, extremely alarming” and made her feel “really vulnerable.”
“It’s because of America’s history, but the specific moment is the day after the election,” she said. “This has to be a strategic effort.”
Another recipient, Hailey Welch, told a University of Alabama student newspaper that some students on campus had also received the messages.
“At first I thought it was a joke, but everyone else understood it. People texted, posted their stories and said they got them,” Ms. Welch told The Crimson White. “I was just stressed and scared because I didn’t know what was going on.”
The wording of the messages varied but often instructed recipients to report to a “plantation” or wait to be picked up by a truck and call for “slave” labor.
In a statement, Derrick Johnson, head of the civil rights group NAACP, said: “These actions are not normal.”
“These messages represent an alarming increase in vile and disgusting rhetoric from racist groups across the country who now feel emboldened to spread hate and hate,” Johnson said. stoke the flames of fear that many of us are feeling following Tuesday’s election results.”
“These messages are unacceptable. We take this type of targeting very seriously,” said Jessica Rosenworcel, chairwoman of the Federal Communications Commission, which is also investigating the messages.
In several states, top law enforcement officials said they were aware of the messages and encouraged people to report them to authorities if they received them.
The Nevada attorney general’s office said it was working to “investigate the origin of what appear to be robot messages.”
In a statement, Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill said Louisiana Bureau of Investigation agents traced some of the messages to a virtual private network — a method of concealing the origin of electronic communications — based in Poland.
Murrill said investigators “could not find a source – meaning they could have originated from any rogue country in the region or around the world.”
The Indiana mother responded to reports that the messages may have originated from abroad, telling the BBC: “The fact that it could have been from abroad doesn’t make it any safer or any better.”
“They know how America thinks,” she said.
