Rep. Fukumoto Responds to Hate Letter

Rep. Beth Fukumoto. Courtesy photo.

After receiving a letter from a self-proclaimed Trump supporter attacking her Japanese ancestry and her support for “illegals, black thugs, Muslims and bombs and gays,” Rep. Beth Fukumoto (Mililani, Mililani Mauka, and Waipio Acres) released the following statement:

“This letter isn’t the first to come across my desk, but it’s so painfully relevant to everything that has unfolded in America these last few days that I believed it needed to be addressed.”

She went further to say that the individual who wrote the letter said he or she was inspired by President Donald Trump.

An excerpt from the letter:

“We Trump people hate illegals, black thugs, Muslims and bombs, and gays… and bleeding heart traitor morons like you… ”

“I worked to fight racist rhetoric when I was a member of the Republican Party, and I left when I realized I couldn’t win that fight from within,” Rep. Fukumoto said. “The white nationalist undercurrent of the Presidential campaign stretched far beyond Donald Trump. His success is the result of white nationalism left unchecked within the GOP for years,”

“Today, every elected official in the GOP needs to make a choice. Be vocal, public and specific in your opposition to prejudice everywhere—especially in the Oval Office,” said Rep. Fukumoto. “Or, be complicit and continue to work peacefully with a party that has gained electoral wins by building coalitions of mistrust and hate,.”

Rep. Fukumoto left the Republican Party earlier this year after being criticized over her participation in the Hawaiʻi Women’s March.