Janet Jackson Falsely Claims Kamala Harris Is ‘Not Black’

Janet Jackson is talking concerning the upcoming U.S. presidential election — and repeating a false declare about Vice President Kamala Harris.

When requested about her ideas on Harris, 59, probably turning into the primary Black lady to be elected president, the Grammy winner, 58, instructed The Guardian that she “heard” the vp is “not Black.”

“Properly, what they supposedly stated? She’s not Black. That is what I heard. That she’s Indian,” Jackson instructed the U.Okay. outlet.

Though Guardian journalist Nosheen Iqbal pushed again towards Jackson’s declare, which has been circulated by former president Donald Trump and right-wing political pundits, the singer stated of Harris, “Her father’s White.”

“That is what I used to be instructed. I imply, I have not watched the information in a number of days,” Jackson continued. “I used to be instructed that they found her father was White.”

Jackson additionally stated she is not positive if “America is prepared” for a girl of colour as a president, as The Guardian put it.

“I don’t know,” she stated. “Actually, I don’t wish to reply that as a result of I actually, in truth, don’t know. I feel both method it goes goes to be mayhem.”

“I feel there is perhaps mayhem,” Jackson added. “Both method it goes, however we’ll must see.”

Reviews from retailers together with CNN, the Related Press and Reuters have confirmed false these claims about Harris’ race and ethnicity.

Harris’ father, Donald J. Harris, is an immigrant from Jamaica who moved to the U.S. to review economics on the College of California, Berkeley. Her mom, Shyamala Gopalan, got here to the U.S. from India and in addition studied at Berkeley, the place the couple met.

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In July, Trump, 78, made false claims about Harris’ race on the Nationwide Affiliation of Black Journalists (NABJ) conference in Chicago.

“She was all the time of Indian heritage, and he or she was solely selling the Indian heritage,” Trump claimed on the time. “I did not know she was Black, till quite a lot of years in the past, when she occurred to show Black, and now she desires to be referred to as Black. So I do not know, is she Indian or is she Black?”

“However what, I respect both one, I respect both one, however she clearly does not, as a result of she was Indian all the way in which, after which unexpectedly she made a flip, and he or she went — she turned a Black individual,” Trump continued.

After Trump repeated the claims towards Harris on the presidential debate on Sept. 10, the vp stated: “Actually, I feel it’s a tragedy that we now have somebody who desires to be president, who has constantly, over the course of his profession, tried to make use of race to divide the American individuals.”

Harris attended Howard College, an HBCU (Traditionally Black Schools and Universities), and in its story about Jackson, The Guardian quoted a line from Harris’ 2019 memoir The Truths We Maintain, wherein she wrote: “My mom understood very properly that she was elevating two Black daughters.”

Harris’ White Home biography additionally states that she is “the primary lady, the primary Black American and the primary South Asian American” to be elected vp.