After Trump's "garbage" statement Somali flag at US school triggers storm of indignation

Staff at a school in the US state of Vermont had to put up with racist phone calls and threats following a solidarity campaign. Many of those who were outraged had only seen half the truth.

Following disparaging remarks by US President Donald Trump about immigrants from Somalia, a school in the state of Vermont has raised the Somali flag next to the US flag. School administration staff and students were then bombarded with racist phone calls and threats on the internet.

President Trump had called Somali immigrants in Minnesota, where a particularly large number of them live, "trash" and said they would contribute nothing to the good of the USA. "I don't want them in our country," the president said. Immigration agents from ICE were ordered to the state last week to apprehend Somalis living there illegally.

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"Small moment of normalcy"

Nine percent of students in the Winooski school district in Vermont are also of Somali descent. "We invited our students and community to come together for a small moment of normalcy in the midst of a tide of racist rhetoric at the national level," said school district Superintendent Wilmer Chavarria, himself an immigrant from Nicaragua, about the Somali flag raising. "We had a really good feeling about it until the ugly reality hit on Monday morning."

The Somali flag was flown alongside the Vermont flag and the US flag on a school building. Students of Somali descent clapped and cheered, Chavarria said. The action meant a lot to them, he said.

Videos only show the Somali flag

However, videos circulating on right-wing networks only showed the Somali flag, but not that of the USA and Vermont, Chavarria said. This had contributed to the particularly strong outrage there. To protect employees from hostility, phone lines and the school district's website were shut down, he said. School employees and others in the community have been subjected to vicious verbal attacks, Chavarria said.

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Mukhtar Abdullahi, an immigrant who serves as a liaison for Somali families in the district, among others, said, "No one, no person, no matter where they're from, is trash." Some students had worried whether their immigrant parents were still safe in the U.S., he said.

A White House spokeswoman, Abigail Jackson, described the calls and messages the school had received as the actions of people "who have nothing to do with Trump". But she also lashed out at migrants. "Foreigners who come to our country, complain about how much they hate America, don't contribute to our economy, and refuse to integrate into our society should not be here," Jackson stated in an email. "And American schools should fly American flags."

With material from the AP news agency.