SPRINGFIELD, Ohio —The woman behind an early Facebook post spreading a harmful and baseless claim about Haitian immigrants eating local pets that helped thrust a small Ohio city into the national spotlight says she had no firsthand knowledge of any such incident and is now filled with regret and fear as a result of the ensuing fallout.

“It just exploded into something I didn’t mean to happen,” Erika Lee, a Springfield resident, told NBC News on Friday.

Lee recently posted on Facebook about a neighbor’s cat that went missing, adding that the neighbor told Lee she thought the cat was the victim of an attack by her Haitian neighbors.

  • BestBouclettes
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    2 months ago

    Oh no, my actions online have real life consequences… Who would have thought?

    • Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works
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      2 months ago

      Yeah, I agree she is at fault for spreading harmful and fucking racist misinformation online. At the same time though it must be wild to have a president candidate pick it up and run with it. It’s a shame it took this kind of experience to make her see the potential harm of her actions.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      I wonder if anyone listens to me…

      okay. lets give this a try.

      Trump is an insurrectionist, a rapist, a traitor. He’s sold national secrets. He cheats at golf, and cheats on his wife. He’s a pedophile. He’s a mass murderer (according to christian doctrine,). He’s a liar, an oathbreaker.

      there’s only one solution