WARNING: This story contains graphic language.
The new advocacy director at a nonprofit group aligned with President Donald Trump shared an N-word laden post written by someone else on Facebook in December 2014.
America First Policies, the nonprofit that works to promote Trump’s agenda, announced Thursday that Carl Higbie would be joining the group to head advocacy, with the group’s president, Brian Walsh, calling Higbie a “loyal fighter for the America-first agenda since day one” in a statement.
Higbie, a former Navy SEAL, resigned from the Trump administration in January after a CNN KFile investigation found he made racist, sexist, anti-Muslim and anti-gay remarks on the radio. Higbie later apologized for his remarks on the radio.
Higbe’s Facebook page previously had stricter privacy settings, but at some point since CNN’s initial report in January, his past postings became viewable.
In a December 18, 2014 post, Higbie shared a post that he claimed was written by an 83-year-old black man. The post uses the N-word, uncensored 20 times.
In sharing the post, Higbie wrote, “these are not the words of me, Carl Higbie but that of Williams [sic] G. Lillas.” He called the man’s thoughts “straight to the point.”
The independent fact-checking website Snopes has said the post, which Higbie attributed to Lillas, a war veteran, had been shared around the Internet in various iterations and is “probably false.”
A CNN search of public records didn’t turn up anyone with that name matching his age and veteran status.
Erin Montgomery, a spokeswoman for America First Policies, told CNN in an email statement that Higbie did not use the N-word in the post and said the original author would have to answer whether he thought the use of the word was racist.
“Carl Higbie’s a hero, who served his country admirably, and you, Messrs. Kaczynski and McDermott, are doing no service to anyone by unfairly targeting someone who has literally taken bullets to protect your First Amendment right to spew falsehoods and propaganda,” Montgomery said.
Higbie did not return a request for comment.
Higbie shared the post when the death of Michael Brown, the teenager who was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, was in the news. The post refers to Brown by the N-word.
“So, let us be clear, Michael Brown was a nigger; a sorry assed, criminal, hoodlum, nigger. Nobody wants to say that, but I will,” the post said.
The post later says black people repeatedly riot and again uses the N-word.
“I have fought communist Chinese and North Korean soldiers in the 1950’s with more honor than that nigger,” it reads. “Yep, I peeled potatoes and shot communists. That’s the only job a nigger soldier could get. Rodney King? Black Riots! Trayvon? Black Riots! Hurricane Katrina? Black Riots! Stealing TV’s, designer clothes, etc. O.J. Simpson kills white man and white woman, found NOT GUILTY? Did white folks riot? Nope! In fact, when is the last time white people rioted? Civil War, maybe? That’s because they are, relatively, civilized people, much like many black Americans.”
The post later says the “militarization” of police is necessary and again uses the N-word. The post also uses the N-word in describing black-on-black murders.
In January, KFile unearthed shocking comments Higbie made on his radio show about black Americans, Muslims, women, LGBT people, veterans suffering from PTSD and immigrants.
After the story published, Higbie resigned from his post as chief of external affairs at the Corporation for National and Community Service and apologized, saying on Twitter, “I’m sorry. I’m not sorry that my words were published, I am sorry that I said them in 2013,” he wrote. “Those words do not reflect who I am or what I stand for, I regret saying them. Last night I informed the WH that I was resigning so as not to distract from POTUS’ many success.”
Higbie also shared content on Facebook that mirrored the racist sentiment he shared on the radio.
In October 2014, he shared a news article about an African man who raped his wife, and then circumcised her. Alongside the article, Higbie suggested that the Ebola virus was “nature’s way of controlling this population.”
In another post in 2014, Higbie shared a link with an image of a black woman that said, “See Obama Voter Can’t Afford Water But Has Money For Manicures, Weaves and Tattos [sic]”. The link led to a video of a woman criticizing a store for charging for water, but the image was an unrelated Associated Press photo of a woman in Detroit who had her water shut off.
In September 2015, he shared an image of two black women standing on the American flag along with a caption that said, “Cancel the welfare checks of anyone who disrespects the US flag.”
