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They also have a knack for shrouding themselves in mystery.
There used to be a Hardaway Auto Sales on the same spot. The numbers do not necessarily bear out the argument the sisters have been repressed. Trump, the sisters insist, is not even a little bit racist—despite the controversies that have dogged him for decades. The liberal site ThinkProgress analyzed Facebook data showing the sisters' page received more interactions during a month when the sisters claimed censorship than at the same time a year before. Retrieved April 11, Maxine Waters , D-Calif. Facebook said they attempted contact via email, Twitter, phone, and Facebook Messenger.
They declined to say where they lived in between. It is unclear when this happened because the sisters declined to provide their exact ages. Though the pair allows that they have other siblings, they declined to say how many. Before that, they were engaged in other occupations, which they also declined to disclose.
Ineitha Lynnette Hardaway and Herneitha Rochelle Richardson, popularly known as Diamond On November 2, , Diamond and Silk appeared with Lara Trump, wife of Eric Trump, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, on behalf of the. "If you had to pick a style of black Republicanism that would fit comfortably in the Trump administration, Diamond and Silk is probably what you.
In early July, Diamond posted a black-and-white video to her dormant YouTube channel. The campaign started blasting it out to Drudge. They see in the businessman qualities that many others miss. In venues like Rolling Out, a publication of black culture, their admiration for Trump has led to awkward questions. How do you answer these critics? Skepticism and hostility from black critics does not deter the sisters, who believe the Democratic Party has done little for black voters.
Trump, the sisters insist, is not even a little bit racist—despite the controversies that have dogged him for decades. What about the saga in the s when Trump was the face of a landmark patterns-and-practices lawsuit brought by the Justice Department against his family for housing discrimination? I want my next president to speak volumes. The mogul has courted black faith leaders for years, and senior members of his campaign confer with them daily. For their part, Diamond and Silk, former Democrats themselves, promote ditchandswitchnow.
Bishop Orrin Pullings of Virginia attended a meeting of black faith leaders at Trump Tower last year. Anyone who calls Trump a racist is wrong, the sisters say, and anyone who questions their support of the president is racist himself. Steve King , the Iowa Republican who invited them to testify in the House.
And since there are two of them, they're maybe even a four-fer. With their blunt catchphrases and outfits color-coordinated to the liquid in Silk's wineglass, the sisters can come across as just another act in our era's 3,ring circus. But they get to America's deepest philosophical questions: Who should speak for whom?
How can one measure authenticity? How can we laugh off Diamond and Silk as entertainment when millions of constituents did the same thing with Trump, who is now the leader of the free world? Butler's field of study is religion, with particular focus on women and African-American religious history. When she watches Diamond and Silk, she thinks of televised preachers.
That is Diamond and Silk, as Butler sees it: The religion of Trump meets the business of televangelism. On a rundown corner a half-hour outside Fayetteville, North Carolina, signs advertise a cluster of businesses under the name Hardaway.
There used to be a Hardaway Auto Sales on the same spot. The biggest sign is for Jericho Deliverance Temple - the cornerstone of the Hardaway enterprise. The pastor is Betty Willis Hardaway, who married her husband Freeman nearly 50 years ago and bore five children, including Ineitha and Herneitha, who would go on to be known by their middle names, Lynnette and Rochelle, and then finally their Trump names, Diamond and Silk.
Freeman and Betty, who go by "Elder" and "Evangelist," are local institutions in this community, where the only downtown businesses open on the weekend are two bail bonds shops. For decades, the couple has evangelized through homemade videos, sitting side by side and preaching directly into the camera.
Outside their home, down a winding unpaved road, a large permanent sign is staked into the sandy ground, which is carpeted with pine needles. McKinnie, a minister at a nearby church. They're real people of God. They are also concerned about the salvation of your waistline. Call the number on the screen.
In addition to the herbs, the Hardaways have sold "blessed dream pillows" and blessed dolls. She had just done this for a woman seeking an apartment, she said in the video, and the woman had found an apartment. The family was entrepreneurial. One son tried to launch a recording career.
A daughter opened a day care. Lynnette now Diamond has been listed as the owner of a hair salon; a family acquaintance remembered either her or Rochelle owning an insurance business. The sisters have said they were entrepreneurs, or worked in manufacturing, before becoming Diamond and Silk. They were also Democrats for many years, like the majority in their "very blue county" outside Fayetteville, said James Davis, chair of the Hoke County Democrats.
He knows the Hardaways.
He did not know what would have made Diamond and Silk - still Democrats as of - switch affiliation. Ron Harman, the county's GOP chair, remembered Diamond and Silk showing up to a chapter meeting several months before the primary. He had never heard of their videos; he does not know if they were even making them yet. He told them he liked Ben Carson. They said they supported Trump. Harman, a transplant from California, did not find it unusual for two African-American women to come to the meeting. The way he interpreted his new county, it was full of conservative-leaning folks - pro-life, pro-military - who only voted Democrat out of tradition and felt guilty about leaving the party.
Diamond and Silk came to a few meetings, and Harman saw them again at the district GOP meeting, where they gave speeches lobbying to be delegates at the state convention. He voted for them but they lost. That was the last time Harman spoke with them. He always found them very friendly, he said, "but when you talk to them, they're not doing their shtick.
On a recent visit to Jericho Deliverance Temple, the doors were shuttered, despite that it was Sunday. Betty announces services on Facebook, but they do not happen with regularity, according to neighbors.
Hardaway's Herb Garden was not open either. Through the windows, the Hardaway family's wares could be spotted on glass shelves - the Colon Cleanse Parasite, the Fat Binder, a book written by Betty, about her faith and weight loss journey: Call the number on the sign for Hardaway's Herb Garden, and you are connected to an unrelated telemarketing firm that promises a free Caribbean cruise after completion of a phone survey. A woman who worked at the beauty shop near the Hardaway family church was circumspect when asked if she knew them. I don't tolerate foolishness.
When you're acting foolish and talking foolish, I shy away from it. And that's all I gotta say. Her first was a short, quiet montage about police brutality, set to music and titled "Black Lives Matter. A video filmed soon after concerned Sandra Bland, an African-American woman whose hanging death in a Texas jail spawned allegations of police brutality. It has received 32, views. After that came the video for which she invited Silk to join her.