MINNEAPOLIS – Days after removing an official from CD7’s Republican party over a racist Facebook post, newly elected Republican Party of Minnesota Chair Jennifer Carnahan has endured her own onslaught of abuse targeted at her via phone and social media.
Carnahan was elected party chair on April 29. On May 1 she quickly removed a party official and condemned a post on CD7 Republicans’ Facebook page which called Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison “Minnesota’s Head Muslim Goat Humper.”
“The hate speech from the 7th CD GOP does not reflect our party or the 7th CD,” Carnahan wrote on Twitter, “As chair, I will not tolerate this activity in our party.”
Apparently that was not enough for some people, as the incident triggered a series of derogatory remarks targeted at Carnahan’s race and gender in response to CD7’s post.
“I guess if you can call a Muslim a goat humper, we Minnesotans can call you a gook? Yes?” reads one message the new party chair received on Facebook.
I didn’t feel scared, but I honestly was just more in shock,” she told City Pages. “There’s just no room to talk to someone like that, even if you’re upset and angry. I was highly insulted and I just thought, ‘What kind of person even uses a word like that, ever, in their life?’”
One man called her and started screaming at her as soon as she picked up, reports City Pages. She recalls the remarks being something similar to, “You better fucking watch your back, you fucking bitch. We’re coming to get you. We know where you are.”
Carnahan vacated her condo for the weekend and went to stay with a friend as a safety precaution. She says several of the people directing this negative attention at her have self-identified as Democrats, reports The Uptake.
DFL Chair Ken Martin described himself as “disheartened” by the racial comments directed at Carnahan, telling The Uptake that there is “no place for that in our political discourse.”
However, Martin also said that he sees a difference between random members of a party harassing Carnahan, and a social media post from an official wing of the party posting something racist.
