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Who is Nikuyah Walker? Charlottesville Mayor slammed after saying city ‘rapes you, comforts in c**-stained sheet’

Trying to defend herself over the blocked post, the Mayor asked, ‘Is this better? I'm asking the person who reported my poem to FB’

Charlottesville elected a female Black Mayor for the first time in November 2017! Nikuyah Walker — an independent who ran under the campaign slogan “Unmasking the illusion” — is now under fire for a controversial poem she posted on social media.

Briefly removed from Facebook, the post contained a few offensive words and read, “Charlottesville: The beautiful-ugly it is. It rapes you, comforts you in its c**-stained sheet and tells you to keep its secret.” Soon after, she went on to share a full version of the poem on Facebook asking if that was better. Now, the mayor is being severely criticized online. As we get more information about why it was posted, here's a background of Nikuyah's life.

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Who is Nikuyah Walker?

Born and raised in Charlottesville, Nikuyah Walker graduated from Charlottesville High School in 1998. She earned her bachelor's degree in Political Science from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2004.

In 2017, she began her campaign which gained traction after the Unite the Right rally. On Facebook, she wrote, “I will bring the kind of change and leadership we need, the kind of oversight that no one else is offering to the table.” Back then, she demanded answers from then-mayor Michael Signer over why a permit had been issued for the rally. Walker and Heather Hill were elected to the city council, winning 29% and 28% of the vote respectively.

Did you know she is the first Independent candidate to be elected to the City Council since the 1940s? In a Guardian interview, she spoke about her early life and said, “Growing up here was tough.” Quoting Michelle Alexander from The New Jim Crow, she added, “The current system of control depends on black exceptionalism; it is not disproved or undermined by it.”

A teen mother who raised three

“I’ve never been interested in only saving myself or my family and getting out. That’s not appealing to me,” she confessed during the interview, adding, “I was a teen mother. I raised three kids. My youngest kid is 15.”

“I don’t know a Black native person [in Charlottesville] who does not have a significant percentage of their family who’s either been incarcerated or is still incarcerated. There is poverty all around, and all the trauma that goes with poverty, you see it on a day-to-day basis. I was fortunate enough, I came from a long line of women – the matriarchs in my family are absolutely amazing. What they had in terms of wealth was tons of love and care,” Walker said.

She also added in the same interview, “When I walk in the room, the conversation shifts. People are quiet. I’m kept out of a lot of discussions. It’s still worth it. It changes the conversation. They are no longer in control of the narrative. Whether they exclude me or not, I’m in the story.”

What is the Charlottesville controversy?

Trying to defend herself over the blocked post, which read, “Charlottesville: The beautiful-ugly it is. It r***s you, comforts you in its c**-tained sheet and tells you to keep its secret,” she wrote, “Is this better? I'm asking the person who reported my poem to FB.”

Read the full post here:

Charlottesville: The beautiful-ugly it is. It lynched you, hung the noose at city hall and pressed the souvenir that was once your finger against its lips. It covers your death with its good intentions. It is a place where white women with Black kids collects signature for a white man who questions whether a black woman understands white supremacy. It is destructively world-class. White people say that it is a place where gentrification started with the election of a Black woman in 2017 and because of white power, a lie becomes #facts. Its daily practice is that of separating you from your soul. Charlottesville is void of a moral compass. It’s as if good ole tj is still cleverly using his whip to whip the current inhabitants into submissiveness. Charlottesville rapes you of your breaths. It suffocates your hopes and dreams. It liberates you by conveniently redefining liberation. It progressively chants while it conservatively acts. Charlottesville is anchored in white supremacy and rooted in racism. Charlottesville r***s you and covers you in sullied sheets.

Later, she went on to post on Facebook, “It looks like FB took me out of FB jail. I guess my post didn’t violate their policies.” But was only slammed further.

Past controversies 

No sooner did the post go viral, people on Twitter couldn't believe their eyes. The mayor of charlottesville appears to believe that the removal of a very graphic post she made on facebook is the result of a coordinated effort by her political enemies to silence her. one write on Twitter and another said, I would highly suggest seeking a restraining order against Charlottesville.

A third wrote, Most mayors try to tailor their advertising to attract those they'd like to see move to their town or city. Let's check in with Charlottesville and see wha— what, now?

Not just that, recently she also said she is under investigation by the city after she used her city-issued credit card to pay for gift cards to compensate people who spoke at City Council meetings on a Facebook Live video. “Speakers come and speak typically about how to infuse equity in the conversation, and I pay them,” she said. “Community members come up with solutions that people who are making [$60,000 to] $200,000 can’t come up with, and I give them $25 gift cards for every hour that they spend and devote to helping us heal this community.”

Walker estimated that she had spent less than $1,000 on gift cards in the last three years.