Thread by @michaelharriot

Y’all wanna hear the TRUE story of Nikki Haley?

A thread

In the 1920s an nativist, white nationalist movement began to rise in America. It was anti-immigrant, racist and it gave rise to what we now call the “Second Wave of the Ku Klux Klan”

What was it called?

It is estimated that 1 in 7 white men were cars carrying members of the Klan during this movement. This is when Donald Trump’s father was arrested at a Klan rally.

One of the hallmark pieces of legislation during this white nationalist trend was the “National Origins Formula”

In 1921, Congress came up with a law that limited how many people could immigrate to the US from each country. White Anglo-Saxon countries could come but Eastern Europeans & other nonwhite countries had specific limits.

In 1923, Bhagat Singh Thind, from Amrit Sar Punjab, India filed a Supreme Court case arguing that the immigration. quotas shouldn’t apply Asian Indians bc they were literally Caucasian

The SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES said: “yeah, you’re Caucasians…

But you ain’t “white”

That precedent stood until 1965 when LBJ signed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965.

Why did he do it?

Because BLACK PEOPLE had fought for civil rights. Because of desegregation and other civil rights laws, Republicans fled the GOP

One of these laws fiercest opponents was the Daughters of the confederacy. This is when they began putting up confederate monuments. In 1961, SC affixed a confederate flag to its courthouse.

One of the interesting results of this white supremacist backlash was…

The Segregation Academy.

Rather than attend integrated schools, white parents created private, all white schools all over the South. MOST of these schools still exist, although they rarely speak of their origin story

theatlantic.com/national/archi…

Now, I don’t want y’all to think that the civil
Rights struggle was over. For instance, an incident considered the bloodiest event of the civil rights era happened in Feb 1968 when cops opened fire on Black student at SC State. Most were shot in the back
history.com/topics/1960s/o…

A few months later, in 1969, Ajit Singh Randhawa, and his wife, Raj Kaur Randhawa, took advantage of the new immigration law & immigrated to the US from Amritsar District, Punjab, India.

3 years later, their daughter Nimarata Randhawa was born

Nimrata’s father taught at at Voorhees, an HBCU in Denmark SC and lived in neighboring Bamberg. Her mom taught in the public schools

At one time, my family owned the only restaurant in Denmark, so I’ve spent a LOT of time there and at Voorhees, the local
HBCU

They are Black AF

But Nimrata would NEVER.

So Nimrata enrolled at nearby Orangeburg Preparatory Schools, a collection of actual segregation academies, and became “Nikki”

Why?

Because she’s Caucasian
Even if she isn’t white.

Here’s a story about the schools

salon.com/2015/07/08/sou…

Now here’s where it gets crazy:

When Nimrata became governor of SC, she refused to take down the Confederate Flag. She said the white supremacist banner was a symbol of heritage and history.

It is possible that Nimrata believed this

See, she went to a racist school. She was Caucasian. She rejected inclusion.

It’s quite possible that Nimrata never knew that flag was the Confederate Battle Flag of Virginia. Nimrata was too dumb to know it had never spent a nanosecond in SC until a century after the Civil War

But when she became a state legislator, Black people TOLD HER that it stood for white supremacy.

She wouldn’t take it down.

They boycotted.

She wouldn’t take it down

When she became governor, she was told that it represented a failed attempt at a white supremacist nation

Nimrata refused

On June 17, a white supremacist terrorist, beckoned by the flag Nimrata supported, walked into Emanuel AME church and slaughtered nine Black people as they prayed.

And Nimrata, whose entire education, citizenship and livelihood was bequeathed unto her

By the literal blood sweat and labor of Black people acquiesced

But here is the thing.

Nimrata knew.

Remember that school where Nimrata’s dad worked when he came to the US?

Well, the longtime president of that school was Cleveland Sellers

Sellers was shot in the Orangeburg Massacre. Many people (and I mean MANY PEOPLE) believe the entire incident was an attempt on his life. Sellers is a civil and was actually incarcerated as a political prisoner for “inciting” the Orangeburg Massacre

When Nimrata was a SC legislator, Cleveland Sellers’ son, @Bakari_Sellers was one of the people who TOLD HER what that flag means

But Nimrata is not like Obama. Her daddy and her mommy pulled themselves up by their bootstraps. Her parents didn’t raise her to be a “victim”

She was “empowered” by the work and the freedom that America offers

Because BLACK PEOPLE GAVE IT TO HER.

And she even got a pair of free bootstraps

You’re welcome, Nimrata

Glad we could help.

To be clear, Nikki didn’t change her name. She chooses to go by her middle name instead of her first. And maybe it’s not fair to point out her actual name.

Im sure people in SC wouldn’t care.

Ask Barack HUSSEIN Obama