Rural Nevada sheriff probes potential hate crime after Black man says he was racially harassed

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Rural Nevada sheriff probes potential hate crime after Black man says he was racially harassed

2024-08-06 10:29 Last Updated At：11:20

RENO, Nev. (AP) — A rural Nevada sheriff is investigating a potential hate crime after a Black man who was collecting signatures for a ballot measure recorded a confrontation with another man he said directed a racial slur at him and said “they have a hanging tree” for people like him.

“I'm still shaking every time I think about it,” Ricky Johnson told The Associated Press by phone Monday as he boarded a plane in northern Nevada back to his home in Houston, Texas.

Johnson posted part of the video of the Aug. 2 incident in Virginia City, Nevada, on social media, and the comments drew swift condemnation from local and state officials. Sponsors of the 10-day Hot August Nights classic car event that was being held at the time said it revoked the registrations of those identified in the video confronting Johnson.

Storey County Undersheriff Eric Kern said Monday the office has completed interviews with Johnson and potential suspects and delivered the case to the district attorney for a decision on any charges.

“As far as a hate crime, it could be an element," Kern told AP. “There is an enhancement we are looking at.”

Johnson, who can't be seen on the video he posted to TikTok, said a white man called him a racial epithet and referenced the “hanging tree” before he started recording the encounter. In the recording, Johnson asks the man to repeat what he said.

A loud, profanity-filled argument on both sides followed before a woman told Johnson he was on her property and he repeatedly asks her not to touch him as they move the conversation into the street, the video shows.

Kern said Johnson provided the video to investigators. He said no one, whether suspect or victim, has been uncooperative in the investigation.

In a statement over the weekend, the sheriff's office said it doesn't condone racism, inequality or hate speech and wants to ensure the public it's doing a thorough investigation.

“But I want to say that in general, in Virginia City, this is not something that happens here," Kern said. “It’s really a sad thing but it’s an isolated incident. It’s has caused a lot of negative impacts on all sides because people are getting a negative opinion. People are calling businesses.”

Storey County District Attorney Anne Langer didn't respond to an email request for comment Monday. A spokeswoman for her office referred calls to County Manager Austin Osborne, who declined to comment on the status of any potential charges in an email to AP but said the “abhorrent and inexcusable” behavior exhibited “by a few individuals are not reflective of our community and our values.”

Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford, who is Black, offered his support Monday to the Storey County Sheriff's Office in the investigation of what he said was a “hateful, racist incident” in one of Nevada's most storied towns.

Virginia City attracts tens of thousands of tourists who walk its wood-planked sidewalks filled with old saloons and stores in the Virginia Range just east of the Sierra, about 30 minutes outside of Reno.

It was Nevada’s largest city in the mid-1800s when the discovery of the Comstock Lode brought thousands of silver miners there. Samuel Clemens got his start in the newspaper business and adopted his pen name, Mark Twain, there at the Territorial Enterprise.

Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo posted on social media saying he was concerned and disappointed by the incident.

“Racism and hate have no place in Nevada — this behavior must be condemned in the strongest terms possible," he wrote on X.

The Virginia City Tourism Commission denounced the “hateful and racist” behavior as “abhorrent and inexcusable.”

Johnson was working for Advanced Micro Targeting Inc., a Texas-based company that provides voter outreach and get-out-the-vote services, to collect signatures for a proposed Nevada state ballot initiative aimed at capping fees that attorneys collect from clients in personal injury cases.

Johnson said he's been the target of racial slurs before but the Virginia City incident was different.

“To be actually in the middle of that and you have no way out. you feel like you’re being surrounded by all these people. I felt closed in,” he said.

Associated Press writer Ken Ritter contributed to this report from Las Vegas.

Tourists can finally visit the Oval Office. A replica is opening near the White House on Monday

2024-09-20 20:45 Last Updated At：20:50

WASHINGTON (AP) — Washington is getting a new tourist stop that offers visitors the next best thing to being in the Oval Office: an identical replica of President Joe Biden 's office, right down to his desk, the armchairs in front of the fireplace and the weathered family Bible resting on a side table.

And when Biden's successor takes office next year, the full-scale replica Oval Office at “ The People's House: A White House Experience " will be redecorated to look exactly like the new president's office, said Stewart McLaurin, president of the White House Historical Association, which is opening the doors of its technology-driven education center to the public on Monday.

A separate space in the center called the “Immersive Theater” uses technology to transform into some of the more notable rooms in the White House every five minutes.

“A terrific thing about this Oval Office, unlike the current Oval Office, is if you’re visiting us you can come and you can sit in this chair and be the president of the United States," McLaurin said, talking about the desk chair as he led The Associated Press on a tour of the center before Monday's opening.

Few people ever set foot in the Oval Office. It is not on the White House public tour route. But at “The People’s House,” not only will visitors get to see what one of the most famous offices in the world looks like, they can experience it, too.

“You can take a call from Mr. Putin or anybody you’d like to receive a call from, have your photo taken there,” McLaurin said. "You can sit on the sofas or in the president's chair as you’ve visualized him sitting there and you see him on the news talking with a visitor or a head of state. You can do the same thing right there in front of the fireplace.”

The wallpaper, draperies, rug, furniture, paintings and other artwork are exact replicas of the furnishings as they are currently in the Oval Office. The plan is to change the decor with each future president.

“It is exactly like President Biden's, exactly,” McLaurin said. “Even the family Bible with the weathered elements are duplicated.”

Except for the “digital column” in the center of the room that shows visitors how the physical office has evolved throughout the presidency. It also turns into a mirror so visitors can see themselves standing in the Oval Office.

Technology is also used to transform the “Immersive Theater” every five minutes into each of the five rooms on the White House State Floor: the East Room, the Red, Blue and Green Rooms, and the State Dining Room. Images on the walls in each room were chosen by the association's historians. Visitors can touch the walls to unlock information about the art, furniture or other history that happened there.

"We want people to feel they are in that room of the White House,” McLaurin said.

Leaving the theater, visitors will walk to the replica Oval Office along a stone path resembling the White House colonnade with a view of art made to represent the Rose Garden.

Another exhibit shows how presidents use the White House for work, family and social functions. Visitors can attend Cabinet meetings and vote on a course of action for the president, sit at a table set as it would be for a state dinner to learn how presidents use these glitzy events to conduct diplomacy, or settle into a seat in the family movie theater.

In a separate gallery, the head groundskeeper, florist, lead military aide and chief usher are among White House staff members featured on video explaining what they do.

After entering the education center, visitors will come upon a large model of the south side of the White House, listen to an audio greeting from first lady Jill Biden and watch an orientation film narrated by Martin Sheen, who played a president on television's “The West Wing.”

The back side of the model looks like a dollhouse, exposing cutaways of the ground, state and residence floor rooms. Visitors can tap electronic kiosks to learn more about the rooms.

The education center covers three floors of an office building at 1700 Pennsylvania Ave., one block from the White House. Technology is used throughout to help teach the history of the executive mansion, the presidents and the families who have lived there, and the staff whose work keeps it functioning in its multiples roles as a workplace, a residence and a museum.

McLaurin said the center was designed to be an enhancement to the White House public tour, not a replacement. But with White House tour tickets hard to get, he expects “the vast majority of the people who have the opportunity to visit here will not have the privilege to visit the White House itself.”

Jill Biden visited twice during construction and has planned an event on the White House lawn on Saturday to celebrate next week's opening.

“This new immersive education center will take visitors on an incredible journey using technology and innovation to bring White House history to life,” said the first lady, a community college professor. “Especially as an educator, I'm so excited to see it opening to the public.”

Admission is free, but visitors must request timed tickets. The association is planning for 800 visitors every day, with most staying a little over an hour.

The association raised $60 million for construction and initial operating costs, and is working to build a $50 million endowment to sustain operations, McLaurin said.

The White House Historical Association was created in 1961 by first lady Jacqueline Kennedy to help preserve the museum quality of the interior of the White House and educate the public. It is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that receives no government funding. It raises money mostly through private donations and merchandise sales, including an annual Christmas ornament.