A Black MAGA influencer says she was booted from a Ken Paxton rally in Texas on Sunday.
Thelma Louise runs a large TikTok account in which she makes pro-Trump content, particularly from her perspective as a Black female conservative. On Sunday, she was excitedly documenting her experience at Paxton’s rally for his upcoming Senate race—before she was asked to leave without cause.
“And there’s no one that I can talk to about this?” Louise asks as she appears to be escorted out. “Wow. Oh my gosh. I cannot believe this.... Someone just came up to me and said that Ken Paxton’s campaign manager wanted me to leave. I am just—my mouth is wide open right now. I really can’t believe this.”
“I was just asked to leave this event, and I did nothing wrong,” she continued. “I was told that Paxton’s campaign manager didn’t want me here. I’m not making any of this up.... I have done nothing but support everyone on the Republican side, and this is how I get treated? I cannot believe the disrespect that I was just given. I left the Democratic Party two years ago, I have volunteered for President Trump’s campaign, and I have worked very hard promoting members of the Republican Party. I’m not quite sure what’s going on, but to be walked out of a room full of people and isolated as if I’d done something wrong—I cannot believe it.”
Louise noted that she drove two hours to get to the rally, and even showed her press credentials for Republicans’ midterm convention in Dallas over the summer.
Some online mused that the color of Louise’s skin may have had something to do with her unexplained removal—and noted that it might not have happened at a James Talarico rally because there would likely be more Black people there.
“‘Being MAGA while Black’ chapter 293,” Democratic strategist Ameshia Cross wrote.
“Conservative whites excluding black people? I’ve never heard of such a thing,” said another.
“Was I mistaken for someone else? I don’t know what it was. And I don’t blame any of this on the Republican Party. Because they have loved me, and they have welcomed me with open arms. But Ken Paxton’s campaign manager, that person is 100 percent responsible for the disrespect that I received this evening.”