WASHINGTON (AP) — Racist text messages evoking slavery have sparked nationwide alarm after being sent to Black men, women and students, including middle schoolers, this week. FBI and other agencies.

The anonymously sent messages were reported in multiple states, including Maryland. new York, Alabama, California, Ohio, Pennsylvania And Tennessee. They often used a similar tone but their expressions were different.

Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown confirmed that his office had received “numerous complaints of racist text messages sent to Black Marylanders, including school-age children.”

“These messages appear to be part of a nationwide campaign and are appalling and unacceptable.” Brown said in his written statement:. “If you receive one of these messages, please report it to your local law enforcement for follow-up and to our Civil Rights Division for evaluation. Hate has no home in Maryland.”

“We know that many people, including our students, received text messages containing racist threats today. We condemn these hateful communications and the fear they aim to instill,” Montgomery County Public Schools said in a statement.

Some text messages instructed the recipient to arrive at an address “with your stuff” at a specific time, while others did not include location information. Some talked about the new presidential administration of Republican Donald Trump, who has come under fire for his racist attitudes and a closing campaign rally that included racist comments.

It was not yet clear who was behind the messages, and there was no comprehensive list of where the messages were sent, but the recipients included high school and college students.

The FBI said it has been in contact with the Justice Department about the messages and that the Federal Communications Commission is investigating the texts “alongside federal and state law enforcement.” The Ohio Attorney General’s Office also said it was investigating the matter.

Tasha Dunham of Lodi, California, said her 16-year-old daughter showed her one of the messages before basketball practice Wednesday night.

Not only did the text use her daughter’s name, but it also directed her to report to a “plantation” in North Carolina, which Dunham said they never lived in. When they looked at the address, they saw that it was the location of a museum.

“It was very disturbing,” Dunham said. “Is everyone trying to figure out what all this means to me? So I definitely had a lot of fear and anxiety.

Her daughter initially thought it was a joke, but emotions were running high following Tuesday’s incident. presidential election. Dunham and her family thought this could have been more nefarious and reported it to local law enforcement.

“I was not in slavery. My mother was not a slave. But we’re a few generations away. So when you think about how cruel and awful slavery was to our people, it’s a very scary and concerning situation,” Dunham said.

About six middle school students in Pennsylvania’s Montgomery County also received the messages, said Megan Shafer, acting superintendent of the Lower Merion School District.

“The racist nature of these text messages is deeply disturbing, and the fact that children are being targeted is even more disturbing,” he wrote in a letter to parents.

Students at some major universities, including Clemson in South Carolina and the University of Alabama, said they received the messages. The Clemson Police Department said in a statement that it had been notified of “deplorable racially motivated text and email messages” and encouraged anyone who received these messages to report them.

Fisk University, a historically black university in Nashville, Tennessee, issued a statement calling messages targeting some of its students “deeply troubling.” He encouraged students to remain calm and assured them that the texts were likely coming from bots or malicious actors with “no real intent or credibility.”

“Wireless providers are aware of these threatening spam messages and are working aggressively to block them and the numbers they originate from,” said Nick Ludlum, senior vice president of wireless industry trade group CTIA.

David Brody, director of the Digital Justice Initiative at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said they are not sure who is behind the messages, but they estimate they were sent to more than 10 states, including most of the Southern state of Maryland. , Oklahoma and even the District of Columbia. The region’s Metropolitan Police force said in a statement that its intelligence unit was investigating the origin of the message.

Brody said a number of civil rights laws can be applied to hate-related incidents. Leaders of several other civil rights organizations condemned the messages, including Margaret Huang, president and CEO of the Southern Poverty Law Center. in question“Hate speech has no place in the South or in our nation.”

“The threat — and the mention of slavery in 2024 — is not only deeply troubling, it perpetuates a legacy of evil that predates the Jim Crow era and now seeks to prevent Black Americans from enjoying the same freedom to pursue lives of freedom and happiness,” said NAACP President and CEO by Derrick Johnson. “These actions are not normal. And we refuse to allow them to be normalized.”

Banner staff contributed to this report.