GREENWOOD Dist.–As authorities investigate racist text messages that were sent to Black students and others across the country, Black students in Oklahoma have also reported receiving the messages.
The messages, which vary slightly, usually contain the person’s name and demands them to report to a slave plantation to pick cotton. USA Today reports several states across the South and across the country, from Alabama, Georgia, Michigan, Oklahoma, Maryland, Virginian and D.C. to New York have reported similar messages.
They were all being sent to Black students at Historically Black Colleges (HBCUs) and high schools. Even some middle schoolers have received it.
Sent just before and after the 2024 Presidential Election, the texts have sent shockwaves throughout a country mired in stark racial and political divisions. It’s unclear where the messages originated from, the Associated Press reports. Some have accused Trump supporters while others speculate a foreign nation is seeking to inflame tensions and divisions among Americans.
Meanwhile, the messages have even reached families who hail from the original Black Wall Street, located in Tulsa, Oklahoma’s historic Greenwood District.
Oklahoma students receive racist text sent across the country
Jackie Weary is a descendant of Black Wall Street business owners and a Greenwood genealogist. She told the Black Wall Street Times her granddaughter received a text.
“You have been selected to pick cotton at the Oklahoma Tulsa Cotton Plantation. Be ready at 5AM SHARP, Thursday November 7 with your belongings,” the text reads. “Our Trump Executives will come et you in a Brown Van, be prepared to be searched down once you’ve enter the plantation. You are in Plantation Group B.”
Jazmine Collins is the mother of Tiara, a seventh grader who attends Central Middle and High School. In a phone call with the Black Wall St. Times, Collins said her daugther believed it was a joke at first. Several of her friends, including from different ethnic backgrounds, received the text as well.
“I had to explain to her this is not a joke. This is, you know, it’s serious,” Collins said. “And I made her aware that this is not just a local thing. This is nation wide right now, I’m seeing it everywhere.”
Collins said she advised both her daughters to block any unknown numbers and to stay aware of their surroundings. She feels Tulsa Public Schools and the Oklahoma State Department of Education should take it seriously and put out public statements.
“Because right now, a lot of the people of color feel like they’re going through these things on their own,” Collins told theBWSTimes. “No one’s taking it serious. If it was a blond-haired, blue-eyed little girl that was getting these things, they’d be raising hell.”
Oklahoma State Department of Education responds
In a statement shared with the Black Wall Street Times Friday afternoon, Oklahoma State Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters condemned the racist messages.
“We will not tolerate racist harassment of Oklahoma students via text message or any other means. These shameful messages are completely unacceptable and do not reflect Oklahoma values,” Walters said.
“I encourage any student or family affected to file an Awareity complaint with our agency. We are actively working with our law enforcement to determine the source of these messages. We will do everything in our power to ensure this offensive harassment stops immediately,” Walters added.
He also sent a statement to superintendents across the state this afternoon.
The Tulsa Police Department told the Oklahoman they hadn’t received any reports, however, a spokesperson for TPD told the Black Wall Street Times they received an online report from Jazmine Collins, whose daughter Tiara received the racist text.
A parent of a student in Edmond, Oklahoma, a suburb of Oklahoma City, also reporting receiving a similar message.
“We’ve reported to both EPSD and the police, parents this is the messaging going around the schools to your black children. Take action,” Esha Wright posted to Facebook Thursday.
So, far Oklahoma Republican Congresswoman Stephanie Bice is the only member of Oklahoma’s federal congressional delegation to weigh in on the texts.
In a response to this reporter on X (formerly Twitter), Bice said, “It’s abhorrent. I hope the FBI tracks down who is responsible and they are held accountable.”
Civil Rights leaders, White House weigh in
On Thursday evening, the FBI released a statement. “The FBI is aware of the offensive and racist text messages sent to individuals around the country and is in contact with the Justice Department and other federal authorities on the matter.” The agency is encouraging recipients of any violent threats to contact law enforcement.
During a White House Press Briefing Thursday, theGrio’s Gerren Keith Gaynor asked about the messages.
“It is important for every community to feel safe [and] to feel protected,” Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre responded.
Civil Rights leaders have also weighed in. “The unfortunate reality of electing a President who, historically, has embraced, and at times encouraged hate, is unfolding before our eyes,” NAACP President Derrick Johnson said in a statement.
The Southern Poverty Law Center urged leaders to condemn anti-Blackness at all levels in a statement.
“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. Hate speech has no place in the South or in our nation,” said Margaret Huang, SPLC president and CEO.
Trump threatens to withdraw school funding over race, history education
The texts come on the heels of Donald Trump securing a second term for the presidency, even after threatening to eliminate the federal Department of Education and pull funding from schools that teach race and history.
In a sit-down interview with Fox & Friends in October, Trump was asked what he would do if schools taught that the nation was “built off the backs of slaves on stolen land, and that curriculum comes in.”
“Then we don’t send them money,” Trump responded.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Oklahoma State Department of Education told the Black Wall Street Times it’s advising families who’ve received the racist texts to file a complaint on OSDE’s Awareity reporting platform. To file a complaint, visit this link.
“Political stuff should stay within us adults. It should not reach the kids,” Collins said. “There’s a kid somewhere that’s gonna get that text message, and they’re gonna freak out. We don’t know what issues they have or what they’ve already been through. It’s not just a little text message.”
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To receive unknown text can be upsetting. The message wreaks of a young , white southerner. Or, hired by Russians. Russians are quite aware of American black – white relations. This person is aware of history. And Oklahoma. That is why I think a white boy (biracial black? )from Alabama.