Fox News disabled the comments section of an article by the Associated Press about President Barack Obama’s 17-year-old daughter, Malia Obama, after readers flooded the post with racist comments, calling her a racial slur, an “ape,” a “monkey” and accusing her of not deserving her entry to the university but getting it thanks to “Black privilege.”
The brief AP article reveals the president’s daughter’s decision to attend Harvard University, like her father, in 2017 after taking a year off from school.
Cruel, racist comments, which were screenshotted prior to being removed, immediately followed. Addictinginfo.org posted some shots several hours after the original article was published:
“I wonder if she applied as a muDslime..or a foreign student..or just a Ni@@er.”
“Hopefully she gets cancer/aids or one of those colored diseases.”
“Another academically challenged affirmative-action parasite steals a place from a qualified White or Asian student.”
Related Story: Michelle Obama: My Critics Don’t Define Me
Users also attacked other members of the Obama family, including First Lady Michelle Obama, who has been the subject of many crude comments in the past.
“I’m sure she’s being fed a stem of celery with two grain muffins for lunch as accorded by her man-thing mother, Sasquatch.”
“Probably staying out for a year so she can help her parents carry out the furniture and dinnerware when they leave the White House,” one user wrote, to which another responded, “Typical.”
A satirical op-ed that appeared in the Chicago Tribune, “Malia Obama’s suspicious gap year,” poked fun at the conservatives who are slamming the young woman for taking a year off between high school and college and are saying she didn’t earn her spot at the prestigious university:
“It’s a well-established fact that Malia is the first child of a president to ever get into Harvard, a clear-cut sign that the fix is in. (The news site Vox did report that, according to the book “America’s Royalty,” 22 presidential children have attended Harvard, but c’mon, are you going to trust liberal facts),” the article reads.
But the joke went over the heads of some commenters, who attacked the president’s daughter once again:
“Malia will have her Harvard transcripts buried, just like Chewbacca and the WH Muslim. As for the gap year, my guess is she will get some heavy tutoring to try to match up at Harvard. If she looks like she won’t cut it, Malia goes somewhere outside the US to hide her further. Gap year, sure. By the way, ever hear either daughter ever talk Can they” one user wrote.
“Doesn’t have the grades, can’t do the work, needs extensive tutoring to have a chance at ANY college, unless Affirmative Action and sealing her transcripts can be arranged (very likely!) Phony Birth Certificate, sealed transcripts from Harvard AND Columbia, ‘gap year’, see a pattern” questioned another.
This is not the first time the conservative media has attacked Malia Obama. Three years ago, when she was just 14, Fox News host Andrea Tantaros called into question the young woman’s sex life after Obama stated he supported providing Plan B to girls as young as 15.
“Are they gonna put her on birth control” Tantaros questioned. “Because he’s very concerned with contraceptives and pharmaceuticals that are going in the mouths of everybody else’s 15-year-old daughter.”
The Obama family is not the first family in the White House to face harsh words from the public (with Rush Limbaugh previously calling Chelsea Clinton a dog when she was just 12 years old and describing Amy Carter as “the most unattractive presidential daughter in the history of this country”). However, the Obamas have faced an unprecedented slew of racism thrown their way in addition to simply a mean-spirited media.
After Thanksgiving in 2014, Elizabeth Lauten, a former communications director for State Rep. Stephen Lee Fincher (Tenn.), bashed Malia Obama and younger sister Sasha Obama, who were 16 and 13 at the time, for their outfits and facial expressions at the annual turkey pardoning.
“Try showing a little class,” Lauten wrote. “Rise to the occasion. Dress like you deserve respect, not a spot at the bar.”
The family has also been compared — negatively — to White House families before them. Mad World News posted an article about the girls around Thanksgiving 2014 as well.
“I don’t think you would have ever seen the Bush daughters in dresses that short,” the article wrote. “Class is completely absent from this White House.”
Malia Obama has faced backlash from the media since her father first took office. At just 11 years old, she was called “a typical street whore” and “ghetto street trash” after wearing a shirt with a peace sign on it.
