Activist Shaun King Responds to Allegations That He Is Not Black

Shaun King, a leading voice in the Black Lives Matter movement, was accused by conservative websites The Daily Caller, Breitbart and The Blaze of being a fraud who misrepresented his race as Black. In response, the author and Daily Kos journalist issued a response to the attacks to prove once and for all that he is not another Rachel Dolezal. “I am gravely embarrassed to even be saying this now, but I have been told for most of my life that the white man on my birth certificate is not my biological father and that my actual biological father is a light-skinned Black man,” he said in a long-form essay. “It is horrifying to me that my most personal information, for the most nefarious reasons, has been forced out into the open and that my private past and pain have been used as jokes and fodder to discredit me and the greater movement for justice in America. I resent that lies have been reported as truth and that the obviously racist intentions of these attacks have been consistently downplayed at my expense and that of my family.” King, who won an Oprah Scholarship, attended Morehouse College, and now appears as an activist on TV talk shows and can be often seen at the forefront of protest sites, also responded to the masses in a slew of tweets.

31. Every single person who knows me BEYOND Twitter, beyond trending topics and HIT PIECES, knows I have never lied about my race.

— Shaun King (@ShaunKing) August 19, 2015

32. Out of LOVE for my family, I’ve never gone public with my racial story because it’s hurtful, scandalous, and it’s MY STORY.

— Shaun King (@ShaunKing) August 19, 2015

King says that this will be the last time he says anything about his race. “I have promised my wife, kids, extended family, and friends that this will be the last time I talk about this publicly for a long time. My work has never been about me and I’ve never made a big deal about my race,” he said. “I’ve actually tried hard to avoid ever making a big deal out of it and have, instead, simply tried to do good work that matters. I’m eager to get back to the cause that concerns me most.”