(NEW YORK) — Many teenagers and college students reported being among those who received racist text messages sent to phone numbers across the U.S. last week.
The texts, which tell the user they’re going to be taken to a plantation to “pick cotton,” have been reported in at least 24 states, plus Washington, D.C, and primarily appeared to target Black users from teenagers to adults, according to investigators in several states.
Most of the texts were sent last Wednesday, the day after the presidential election.
“I don’t understand why there’s so much hate in this world,” Nicole Nuñez, whose 15-year-old son attends a Los Angeles charter school, told ABC7. “I don’t understand why they don’t like us because of the color of our skin.”
TextNow, a mobile provider that allows people to create phone numbers for free, said Friday that it discovered “one or more” of its users allegedly sent out racist text messages and that the service quickly shut down the accounts. The text messaging service told ABC News that they were cooperating with law enforcement and condemned the messages.
Some of the messages address the recipients by name.
The TextNow representative said once the accounts that were allegedly behind the texts were reported, the accounts were disabled in less than an hour.
Los Angeles Superintendent Alberto Carvalho addressed the many students in his district that reported receiving the messages.
“We are aware of racist and incendiary texts that are being sent to students nationwide, including to some of our students,” Carvalho said in a statement acquired by ABC News. “We unequivocally condemn this hateful and threatening rhetoric. We are investigating this situation. If you receive one of these messages students and families should contact their school for support.”
One text message reviewed by ABC News read, “You have been selected to pick cotton at the nearest plantation. Be ready at 12 pm sharp with your belongings. Our executive slaves will come get you in a brown van. Be prepared to be searched down once you’ve enter the plantation. You are in plantation group W.”
As of Saturday, the texts were reported by authorities in California, Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Kansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Connecticut, Illinois, Nevada, Tennessee, Indiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Washington, D.C.
At least five students at Fisk University, a historically Black institution in Nashville, received the offensive text messages, the university told ABC News in a statement. Some told the school that their peers had received the texts as well, it noted.
“We are aware of disturbing and offensive messages circulating on social media, appearing to target members of our community,” Fisk University said in its statement. “These messages, which suggest threats of violence and intimidation, are deeply unsettling. However, we want to assure you that these are likely the work of an automated bot or malicious actors with no real intentions or credibility.”
Local and federal investigators, including the FBI, said they were looking into the messages and urged anyone who received them to contact the authorities. The probes are ongoing.
A senior law enforcement official told ABC News that it has not been determined if the source of the racist texts is domestic or foreign, but efforts are underway to determine their origin.
Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill said in a video statement posted on X Friday that “some” of the racist text messages “can be traced back to a VPN in Poland.”
“At this time, they have found no original source — meaning they could have originated from any bad actor state in the region or the world. We will continue to investigate,” Murrill said.
Murrill told ABC News that, in addition to the messages being “vile” and “racist,” they could also contain malware.
The president of the NAACP’s San Francisco branch Reverend Amos Brown called for the community to come together and denounce the offensive texts, ABC7 reported on Monday.
“City officials, pastors, democratic clubs, need to speak up and speak out and cannot be silent if you are silent it suggests you are complicit with evil,” Brown said, according to ABC7.
Carryn Freeman, who runs a non-profit near Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, said that she and some of friends’ children received the texts. Their parents are angry and want to know what to do to make sure this doesn’t happen again, she said.
“I got mad that my friends’ children were receiving this, 15 year olds who are having to process very overt pre-Jim Crow, transatlantic slave trade level racism in their text messages,” Freeman told ABC News on Friday. “Then they have to go to school the next day.”
ABC News’ Pierre Thomas, Abby Cruz, Luke Barr and Emmanuelle Saliba contributed to this report.
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