Haley: Remarks "taken out of context"

Teresa Haley says her controversial comments about immigrants brought from the Mexican border to Chicago were misinterpreted and taken out of context.

The president of the Springfield branch of the NAACP also told Illinois Times she regrets using the term "savages" in reference to the thousands of immigrants who have been flown and bused to Chicago's west and south side neighborhoods.

Haley, 58, was suspended by the national NAACP as the unpaid president of the civil rights organization's Illinois State Conference on Dec. 13 because of the comments, captured on video during a private Zoom meeting with Illinois branch presidents and other local NAACP officials in November. She said the call was illegally recorded by one of the meeting participants.

Haley, who received the "activist of the year" award from the national NAACP in 2020 and has been lauded in Springfield for her volunteer efforts and activism, apologized "to anyone who may have been hurt or offended by my comments," according to a written statement Dec. 14 from the state conference.

Haley spoke with Illinois Times on Jan. 15 after a public forum on immigration connected with a celebration of Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church. It was her first media interview since her remarks were released on YouTube and publicized in December by a former DuPage County NAACP branch president.

Haley has requested a hearing with national NAACP officials to plead her case and regain her title. Officials at the national office in Baltimore haven't responded to requests for comment. The NAACP hasn't clarified whether Haley can continue to act as the Springfield branch's president, an unpaid position, so she said she is speaking on her own behalf for now, and not on behalf of the NAACP.

Haley said she is hoping to be elected to the NAACP's national board of directors. She said the unpaid position would give her a bigger platform for advocating that federal officials establish an archaeological site near Madison Street and the 10th Street Rail Corridor as a national monument to the 1908 race riot in Springfield. The riot helped lead to the creation of the NAACP.

Voting for the election concluded in December, but results won't be released until February, Haley said.

Recalling the November Zoom call, Haley said savages isn't a word that is part of her everyday vocabulary. She said she used the word in the video when she was summarizing and referring to the same term used by at least two other Illinois branch presidents during the meeting.

Illinois NAACP officials were airing concerns about immigrants being transported unannounced by Texas officials to impoverished, predominantly Black Chicago neighborhoods in late fall and winter.

Haley told Illinois Times she regretted repeating her peers' comments.

"A good leader listens and summarizes what is being said," she said. "My intent was just to simply have the conversations and let my branch presidents and leaders know, 'I hear you. I'm listening to you.'"

Haley said on the Zoom call that Chicago and other American cities are more eager to find immigrants safe housing than when they serve low-income Black people.

"But Black people have been on the streets for ever and ever, and nobody cares because they say that we're drug addicts, we've got mental health issues," Haley said on the November call. "But these immigrants who come over here, they've been raping people, they've been breaking into homes, they're like savages as well. They don't speak the language, and they look at us like we're crazy because we were the only people in America who were brought over here against our wills and were slaves, sold into slavery.

"But everybody who comes over here? We're so kind, we're so friendly."

Haley told Illinois Times that immigrants and Black residents deserve equal access to services.

Referring to the immigrant situation in Chicago, she said Black leaders have "worked really hard to clean up certain communities, and then you drop a bunch of people in who don't know the language, and don't know the culture, and everybody is fighting for survival for themselves. It's not the immigrants' fault, and we never said it was, nor did I.

"We said it was a concern, and it needed to be addressed, and so I allowed my presidents to talk about what their concerns were."

Since the Zoom video was made public, Haley has come under fire from Latino groups that said immigrants and poor people of all colors have similar needs and shouldn't be criticizing each other.

Haley said her words should be interpreted as a call to action by policymakers for immigration reform and equal treatment rather than criticism of immigrants.

"I'm always willing to work with all communities – not only the Latino community, all communities," she said.

Haley said it was "out of order" for Gov. JB Pritzker to criticize her comments and call for her to apologize.

Haley said she believes the Democratic governor's comments were fueled by policy differences between the two, including Haley's opposition to legalization of adult-use marijuana and the NAACP's unsuccessful legal challenge of the new legislative redistricting map that Pritzker signed into law.

Initial news reports of Haley's comments included her statement during a brief phone call with a reporter while she was overseas on vacation in which she initially suggested she didn't make the comments. She reportedly said the comments may have been manufactured through the use of artificial intelligence.

Haley told Illinois Times that she didn't realize the reporter was referring to the November NAACP Zoom meeting, which was surreptitiously recorded by former NAACP DuPage County branch president Patrick Watson without the permission of other participants.

"The reporter tried to bum-rush me by referring to a video that I hadn't seen nor heard of since I was out of the country," Haley said.

Watson told Illinois Times in December that he recorded and released a two-minute section of the two-hour-long November video after complaining to the national NAACP for months about what he called Haley's disregard for NAACP bylaws on acceptable business practices.

Watson said Haley also has engaged in "hate speech against the LGBTQ community" by questioning the requested use of they/them pronouns by certain national NAACP staff members. Haley denied Watson's allegations.

Watson said he resigned Dec. 12 as president of the branch, which covers DuPage, Kendall, Kane, Will and part of northwest Cook County, because of Haley's conduct and requested her resignation. He said NAACP members voting on her bid for the national board also needed to be informed.

Haley said Watson never complained to her about specific comments.

Watson told Illinois Times on Jan. 18, "Why would I bring these statements up to her when she was retaliating against me?" He added that his recording of the Illinois NAACP officials' Zoom meeting was legal because "there was no disclaimer that this was not to be recorded."

Michael Childress, 67, a Bloomingdale resident who succeeded Watson and DuPage NAACP president, said branch officers took a non-binding vote of "no confidence" in Watson's leadership on Nov. 14.

Childress said he believes Watson waited until Dec. 12 to express outrage about Haley's Nov. 30 comments so Watson could unfairly discredit Haley and kill her bid for the national NAACP board, all in retaliation for her prior order that Watson receive additional training during his term as president.

Watson said he believes Haley doesn't deserve to be on the national NAACP board because of her comments about immigrants and the LGBTQ community. Watson said he didn't release the video in response to Haley's order. 

Childress said Haley didn't deserve to be suspended before NAACP officials held a hearing.

"She was being vilified without getting her due process," Childress said. "I am an advocate of hers. I don't believe in 'cancel culture.' ... We're not talking about a person who has a history of being a hateful person."

National NAACP officials have given no timeline for a final decision on Haley's status, Haley and Childress said. The delay and silence from the national office are frustrating, Childress said.

The release of her comments created a "firestorm" when she returned from vacation, Haley said.

"I was humiliated, I was overwhelmed, I was sad," she said. "I was stressed, depressed, couldn't eat, couldn't sleep, and I was devastated. I've received hate mail and death threats as a result of the video."

Dean Olsen is a senior staff writer at Illinois Times. He can be reached at [email protected], 217-679-7810 or twitter.com/DeanOlsenIT.