Donations surge for Emmett Till memorial after white nationalists caught filming video
Donations have poured in for a memorial dedicated to Emmett Till in Mississippi after white supremacists were caught filming a propaganda video in front of the monument over the weekend. Patrick Weems, executive director at the Emmett Till Memorial Commission, told CBS News on Monday that the non-profit has received more than $10,000 since the incident on Saturday.
The Emmett Till Interpretive Center released a video on their Facebook page showing at least eight people standing before the bulletproof marker that was installed last month. Two women are shown filming while two men hold up Neo-Confederate flags. One of the flags appeared to belong to the "League of the South," a hate group that "advocates for a white-dominated, independent South," according to the Anti-Defamation League.
In the footage, a man is overheard saying, "We are all here are the Emmett Till monument that represents the civil rights movement for blacks. What we want to know is where are all of the white people."
White supremacist group at Emmett Till markerA white supremacist group visited our Emmett Till historic marker, dedicated just weeks ago, today. Thank them for reminding us why this work matters by donating at http://emmett-till.org
Posted by Sumner Courthouse and Emmett Till Interpretive Center on Saturday, November 2, 2019
In another video, the group scattered and ran to their cars after hearing sirens go off.
Following the incident, the Emmett Till Interpretive Center thanked them for "reminding us why this work matters" and asked people for donations. Weems told CBS News that they received more than $10,000, which will go toward the Emmett Till Memory Project. The funds will help create a permanent memorial at the river site, according to Weems.
The bulletproof memorial was unveiled last month after previous historical markers were vandalized.
In 1955, Till was visiting relatives in the Mississippi Delta when he was kidnapped from a relative's home after an encounter with a white woman at a country store. He was tortured and later shot, with his body found weighted down by a cotton gin fan in the Tallahatchie River –– located near the spot of the memorial sign.
An all-white jury in Mississippi acquitted two white men in the crime. The woman, Carolyn Donham, acknowledged during a 2008 interview that she wasn't truthful when she testified that Till grabbed her, whistled and made sexual advances at a store. His brutal slaying helped spur the civil rights movement more than 60 years ago.