Valentina Gomez, a Republican candidate vying to be the next Secretary of State of Missouri, was widely criticized after she shared a video directing racially charged and homophobic remarks at Black Americans ahead of the national Juneteenth holiday.
Officially declared a national holiday by President Joe Biden in 2021, Juneteenth has been celebrated for decades by Black families in the U.S. It marks the emancipation of the last enslaved African Americans in Galveston, Texas, in 1865.
Gomez—who emigrated to the United States from Colombia as a child—advised those who want reparations for our country's long and violent history of chattel slavery to "get the f**k" out, calling Juneteenth "the most ratchet holiday in America."
She said:
“Reparations from slavery and Black victimization is about to be shoved down our throats for the most ratchet holiday in America. BLM [Black Lives Matter] raised millions. And what did they do for Black lives?”
“It is outrageous to see people ask you for reparations, even though they never went through slavery. These ungrateful people should be celebrating because they were born in the greatest nation to ever exist.”
“Here’s a tip. If you don’t like America, kindly, get the f**k out.”
The video concludes with a picture of Gomez posing with an assault rifle.
You can hear what she said in the video below.
Slavery was in fact a brutal legal institution, comprising the enslavement of Blacks who were kidnapped from their homes and families and forced to reside in a foreign land where they served as the economic backbone of the American South.
The treatment of slaves in the United States varied widely depending on conditions, time, and place, but in general it was brutal, especially on plantations. Whippings and rape were routine. The asymmetrical power dynamics between enslaved Blacks and white slaveowners gave whites both de facto and de jure freedoms to bend their property to their will.
Conservatives have repeatedly come under fire for presenting a revisionist and misleading view of history, downplaying the profound impact of slavery and omitting key complexities surrounding the Founding Fathers' attitudes and actions toward it.
False claims that schools have been teaching critical race theory—a body of legal and academic scholarship—to young children have also inflamed hostilities among the right wing, particularly since the publication of The 1619 Project, which repositions the consequences and legacy of slavery as elements vital to the historical narrative.
Gomez was swiftly criticized for her remarks.
Gomez has previously made headlines for a variety of attention-grabbing acts, notably a video in which she employed a flamethrower to incinerate LGBTQ+-friendly books. Her campaign emphasizes issues such as "protecting children against the transgender agenda" and "protecting sports — there are only 2 genders."
The 24-year-old is total MAGA, backing former President Donald Trump's "Big Lie" that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
A central pledge highlighted on her website is the elimination of electronic voting machines in favor of transitioning to universal paper-ballot hand counting, a false stance in line with a prevalent belief among MAGA supporters that these machines enable election fraud.
Last month, she was criticized for advising Americans not to be "weak and gay" in a bizarre campaign ad showing her jogging in a bulletproof vest and posing with an assault rifle.