Controversy continues over ex-USDA employee, alleged racial remarks
A conservative Web site posted video of a speech from Shirley Sherrod, the former director of rural development in Georgia, at a NAACP event from March. Sherrod, who is African-American, describes meeting a white farmer when she worked for a nonprofit rural farm aid group and says on the video, "I didn't give him the full force of what I could do." The website posted the video to allege that the NAACP condones racism. Sherrod says that she was asked to resign shortly after the clip was posted, which she did.
Now that she has resigned, Sherrod says that the video was edited to misconstrue her comments, reports the Associated Press. She said the situation ultimately "opened my eyes" that helping farmers wasn't so much about race but was "about the poor vs. those who have." She added that she became friends with the family and spent more than two years working to save their farm.