After a black female Baylor University student said she was shoved and called a racial slur while walking to class, 300 people — students, teachers, and administrators — showed up to walk her to class in a show of solidarity with her.
Natasha Nkhama was walking to class the morning after Donald Trump won the presidential election when a male student bumped into her, pushed her off the sidewalk, and told her, “no n—s allowed on the sidewalk,” she said in a Facebook video.
A male student defended Nkhama and told her aggressor that his behavior wasn’t OK, but the student who used the slur reportedly referenced Trump’s campaign slogan, saying “I’m just trying to make America great again.”
Two days after Nkhama posted the video account of the incident on Facebook and her friend shared the video on Twitter, 300 fellow students, teachers, and administrators greeted her on her way to class. They had organized around the Twitter hashtag #IWalkWithNatasha and wanted to be sure she was safe.
School officials met with Nkhuma to address her concerns and support her. “We are a caring, Christian community in which acts of violence and insensitivity have no place,” Baylor Vice President for Student Life Kevin P. Jackson said in a university response to the incident. “As Baylor Bears, it is our responsibility to care for and treat each other with love, compassion and dignity. Any behavior short of this demands our full attention so that we can hold each other accountable while seeking to reconcile and restore damaged relationships.”
The identity of the student who attacked Nkhuma was not given, and it is not known whether he was identified or disciplined by Baylor.