Why do Muslims come to America, asks US school board chairperson

Virginia school board chairperson says she had not shared the post ‘maliciously’

Virginia school board chairperson has caused an uproar after posting an anti-Muslim cartoon on Facebook, questioning why Muslims wanted to come to America.

The post read, “Muslims hate pork, beer, dogs, bikinis, Jesus, and freedom of speech. My question is, what the hell do they come to America for?!” The controversial meme, which was shared from the Facebook group, The Conservative Hammer, has since been taken down.

Screengrab from Council on American-Islamic Relations Facebook

Read: Muslim student arrested in US after home-built clock mistaken for bomb

Christie New Craig, chair of the Chesapeake School Board and the chief of staff to state Senator John A Cosgrove Jr (R-Chesapeake), told The Virginian-Pilot that she had not shared the post ‘maliciously’ and that she did not mean to offend anyone when she shared the cartoon on August 4.

“I’m not racist. I wasn’t raised that way,” Craig said.

The City of Chesapeake School Board and Public Schools released a statement on Thursday afternoon, which read, “A recent social media post has resulted in some concern voiced by an advocacy group indicating its representation of a segment of the community. This post has had no effect on our commitment to maintaining equal opportunity and non-discrimination standards.”

The issue of the post was raised the same week that a Muslim student Ahmed Mohamed was arrested in Texas after bringing a home-built clock to school, which his teacher mistook for a bomb. The teenager was arrested and taken to the police headquarters for questioning. He was later released, but the incident was widely reported by the media and was even taken notice of by the US president Barack Obama and other high-profile names such as Hillary Clinton and Mark Zuckerberg.

Read: Obama invites arrested Muslim schoolboy to White House

Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) spokesperson, Ibrahim Hooper, said both the incidents revealed that anti-Muslim sentiment were rising in the US and had even extended to public schools. Commenting on the cartoon, he said that it was bigoted and inaccurate, since Muslims regarded Jesus with the utmost respect.

He further added that the cartoon, “Reinforces this notion that the Muslim community is a foreign implant. We’re not foreign to America. We’re Americans. We’re productive citizens here. We’re Americans just like anybody else.”

CAIR has called for an apology as well as ‘some kind of action to ensure that these kind of bigoted views are not translated into policies that impact Muslim students in the district.’

This article originally appeared on The Washington Post