An online fundraiser has collected nearly $150,000 for a historically black church in Mississippi that was burned and then defaced with the words “Vote Trump.”
In 22 hours, $147,654 was raised, according to its GoFundMe page helping the Hopewell Missionary Baptist Church in Greenville, Miss.
{mosads}“When I ginned up this page before my first meeting at work today, I had no earthly clue it would get so big,” organizer J. Blair Reeves Jr. wrote in an update late Wednesday.
“Responses have been pouring in from all over the world, and they’re truly extraordinary. Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, atheists and many more, from all over the United States and many other countries.”
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s campaign on Wednesday denounced the incident.
“We are deeply saddened for the members of the Hopewell M.B. Church community and condemn in the strongest terms this terrible act that has no place in our society,” Trump’s team said in a statement.
No injuries were reported in the incident. The FBI’s Jackson Division is “aware of the situation” and working to determine if “any civil rights crimes were committed.”