The daughter of George Floyd, who was killed at the hands of Minneapolis police in 2020, is reportedly being subjected to bullying at school over her father’s death.
Just days ahead of the fifth anniversary of Floyd’s death, Roxie Washington, who shared 11-year-old daughter Gianna with Floyd, reported that the young girl is facing taunts from her classmates echoing the sentiments of MAGA conservatives who are calling for her father’s killer to be pardoned.
“They’ve teased her at school,” Washington told the Minneapolis Star Tribune. “They know about her father and the nasty things bad people say about him, so they repeat those words.”
MAGA personalities, including political commentator Ben Shapiro and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, are urging President Donald Trump to pardon former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who knelt on Floyd for over nine minutes, killing the 46-year-old Black man. Right-wing stars have pushed false claims that Floyd died of a drug overdose instead of being killed at the hands of police.
Washington said she’s been unsure how to respond to Gianna’s classmates who are repeating right-wing rhetoric.
“Do I run up to the school and act like ‘Who did what?’ Or do I let her fight her own battle?” she said. “I don’t want her to feel like she’s by herself. But I want her to be able to stand on her own two feet.”
Amid police brutality protests and the nation’s racial reckoning, at just six years old, Gianna became a symbol of hope as she proclaimed “Daddy changed the world” to a rallying crowd. The young girl, now 11, is still grappling with the impact of her father’s death.
“She’s still a kid,” Washington said of her daughter. “She’s not going to understand the weight that her father carries. She doesn’t understand how huge of a name he has. She just knows he’s her dad.”
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