A Long Island assemblywoman angrily invoked “plantation” politics in a stunning attack on a fellow black woman who is challenging her in the Democratic primary, video obtained by The Post shows.
The astounding, racial rant took place during a candidates forum on Thursday, at which Deputy Assembly Speaker Earlene Hooper (D-Hempstead) branded opponent Taylor Raynor as a tool of white power brokers.
“I have been able to survive, and I fight for my people. Then I have to come here and fight with my people,” Hooper said.
“It reminds me of what happened before the Civil War, when we were on plantations and someone decided to run, and the person who happened to be in massa’s good graces would tell on Big Jim, who’s planning to run away when it’s dark, when there’s a new moon.
“So, that’s what happened now, we have a plantation.”
As Raynor shook her head and frowned just a few feet away, the 30-year incumbent wrapped up her remarks by doubling down.
“My time is up, but I leave you with this: [the] white man fooled us out of Africa,” Hooper told the largely black audience.
“Don’t let him fool you out of a seat where you have power.”
Hooper, the fourth-ranking leader in the Assembly, then glared directly at Raynor as she stormed away from the podium to cheers and applause.
Raynor, a psychologist and community activist who already has the Working Families Party line, accused Hooper of engaging in “race-baiting,” and blasted the assemblywoman’s remarks as “disgusting” and “deplorable.”
“She wanted to discredit me as a woman of African-American descent. That I’m just a puppet representing the white man. Is that all she got?” Raynor, 34, told The Post.
Nassau County Democratic Chairman Jay Jacobs said Hooper’s speech before the New Hempstead Democratic Club had cost her his backing in the Sept. 13 primary election.
“At that meeting, Earlene was unhinged. I condemn those remarks. I hope she would apologize for them,” Jacobs said.
“I’ve supported Earlene in the past. This time I’m not. I can’t support someone who says those things. It’s likely I will be endorsing Taylor.”
Hooper, a retired social worker, has served in the Assembly since winning a special election in March 1988. Recent voter-registration records say she is 69, but earlier records list a date of birth that would make her 84.
She didn’t return messages seeking comment.
Hooper and Raynor are vying to represent the 18th Assembly District, which covers Nassau County’s predominately minority residential communities of Hempstead, Roosevelt, Uniondale and Freeport.
Additional reporting by Bruce Golding
