30 black students removed from Trump rally on Georgia campus 'on candidate's orders'
Around 30 stunned black college students were kicked out of a Donald Trump rally at their Georgia campus after the Republican candidate told his Secret Service agents to get them out.
The young men and women, some of them crying, were escorted from a stadium at Valdosta State University by federal Secret Service agents assigned to Trump who said the candidate insisted the students be removed before he start speaking, the Des Moines Register reported.
The students had been standing quietly near the top of the bleachers awaiting Trump's arrival when they were approached by the Secret Service.
"We didn't plan to do anything," said a tearful Tahjila Davis, a 19-year-old mass media major and one of the students kicked out. "They said: 'This is Trump's property; it's a private event.' But I paid my tuition to be here."
The confrontation was particularly painful on the Valdosta campus, which was an all-white state university until 1963.
Trump campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks denied in an email that the students were shown the door "at the request of the candidate," the Register reported.
Earlier in the day, some black students at another Trump campaign rally, on the campus of Radford University in Virginia, were led out by Secret Service after they began chanting: "No more hate! No more hate! Let's be equal, let's be great!"
The Valdosta students left the stadium quietly but argued with town police officers who told them they had to leave the grounds of the Trump event, even though it was being held at their school's stadium.
"I don't understand why they would do something like that," Davis said. "I have not experienced any racism on this campus until now."
At the Valdosta rally, Trump said he's leading a movement, adding: "I'm just a messenger."
He said his whole life has been about making money, but "now I'm going to be greedy for the United States; I'm going to take, take, take and we're going to become rich again."
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