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As the news of Black Lives Matter activist Sasha Johnson being shot became public in May 2021, social media contained images which allegedly show a tweet posted by her stating:

the white man will not be our equal but our slave

However, searching for her name and this quote only reveals far-right blogs and news sites posting this claim, I couldn't find this anywhere else. Not on Wikipedia, not in the centrist or left-leaning media, not in the mainstream conservative media. Did Sasha Johnson tweet this? Is it a hoax?

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The tweet in question (alternative archive link) was very likely sent from a fake account (although Twitter being what it is, this is unlikely to ever be conclusively proven either way). The account that seems to be her real Twitter (@Sashapanther93) has denied any connection with the tweet (and its message). In addition, the same thing was said by the Taking the Initiative Party where she is a member of the Executive Leadership Committee, as reported by Insider:

The party said the account @SashaJohnsonBLM was "not created by Sasha" and was "created to persecute her."

On Reddit, green_flash's comment outlines some other points:

  • If you google sashajohnsonblm which is the account name used for that tweet, there is no mention of it before Aug 26, 2020 at all, no other tweet, no link, not a single outraged reaction. Seems unlikely.
  • She doesn't use the "blm" as part of her account name on any other platform, on Instagram for example she's thesashajohnson. The "blm" in the account name is very useful for propaganda purposes against BLM though
  • The profile image used for the account seems to be this Shutterstock image. Would she use a stock image as her profile image? Seems unlikely.

Not definitive proof, but it means that anyone could have gotten the image.

And this is what they said about the account that made the tweet:

  • Describing herself as "Oxford Black Lives Matter Leader" which she never was, she just spoke at BLM rallies in Oxford

To call her any type of leader at Oxford BLM seems to be an exaggeration. Neither their Instagram nor Twitter ever mentioned her as far as I can tell (not even after she was shot). The Instagram or Facebook of "the BlackLivesMatter Global Network Foundation", for example, describes her as "an ally of BLMUK" — she's apparently not even a member there.

  • No activity except for a flurry of racist tweets on a single day and a retweet of an old white man with a Hong Kong flag in his profile criticizing a self-described socialist journalist - yeah that's totally what a BLM activist would do

As I understand it, the account was live for a number of months and had more activity (75 Tweets) than what can be seen via any archive I've found. Still, it was not well known before.

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    The second blockquote is mostly non-sequitur. None of those points really say much on the validity of the account and it's tweets. It's suspicions at best (i.e. I don't feel like the real person would do this).
    – user11643
    Commented May 28, 2021 at 20:21
  • @fredsbend What do you suggest I do with it? (No longer the second block quote btw :p). I was thinking that I could probably remove some of it, though some of the circumstantial evidence I found helpful (eg that it's a stock photo) even if it's only a suspicion.
    – Laurel
    Commented May 28, 2021 at 20:48
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    IDK, just suggesting that the points don't illuminate anything. I don't have ideas on this kind of thing. I don't use Twitter, and never have. It seems to me that 1) making fake accounts is easy, and 2) outside of the "blue checkmark" verifying account ownership is extremely difficult. That leaves truth seekers fighting a gish gallop. I guess when the result of verifying obscure ownership would be harm to the supposed owner's character, pushing the onus of providing proof onto the claimant is the reasonable position, but that's not really our mode here.
    – user11643
    Commented May 28, 2021 at 20:57
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    in this tweet. I cannot find any mention of her on twitter or anywhere else relating to her regarding BLM before June 2020, and I think it would be bold to assume that a fake account in the name of a at that point rather obscure person had been set up in May 2020. However, analyzing tweets mentioning the name Sasha Johnson or the handle@sashajohnsonblm suggest that she became a controversial figure at least in the twitter-sphere on July 22 2020, when a discussion with her and right-wing activist...
    – EpicBroccoli
    Commented May 30, 2021 at 20:38
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    @EpicBroccoli You should put together your own answer, at this point. This is quite a lot of comments.
    – user11643
    Commented May 31, 2021 at 15:55
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The tweet is still available in the wayback archives.

The account in question is suspended from twitter, but the archives show that this was an account that was only active for a short time in August 2020 with 3 followers and no blue checkmark.

Absence any evidence linking Johnson to the account or the ideas espoused there, the most likely explanation is that it is a fake account created to discredit her.

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    Regarding the direction of this answer, I normally agree, but we strive for the evidence either way, regardless whether appropriate discourse normally puts the onus for proof on the claimant. In the least, perhaps noting where we should expect evidence and not finding it should be added to this answer.
    – user11643
    Commented May 28, 2021 at 21:02
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The tweet and the account were genuine. Sasha Johnson then created a new account and denied the original.

The suspended Twitter account was created in May 2020. This was the exact time that Johnson started arranging and speaking at BLM protests. There were racist tweets on the profile from its creation in May 2020. This account was suspended in August 2020 after the racist tweets on there gained exposure.

Johnson's current account was created in September 2020 after the original account was suspended in August 2020 for the infamous pinned tweet dated 2nd August 2020.

I looked at the reasons given by Reddit's green_flash and consider them to be circumstantial and ahistoric.

None of the Twitter accounts were/are verified because Twitter has suspended their "blue tick" verification in 2017. No one during that time has been able to verify their account.

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    This is largely unreferenced speculation and personal political opinion. I will be editing it down to focus on the parts you actually have evidence for.
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Commented May 29, 2021 at 14:04
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    After a major edit, I think the structure of the argument is: Green_Flash produced a long list of circumstantial evidence, each one pushing the needle towards the fake it was a fake account. The OP went through each one and showed it was circumstantial and there might be another explanation. From that the OP has concluded it couldn't possibly have been fake. Identifying weaknesses in the argument in one direction is helpful. Concluding that the opposite must be true as a result is a fallacy.
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Commented May 29, 2021 at 14:25
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    In summary: No evidence is given here to show it is an authentic account, only that it isn't safe to categorically conclude that it is fake.
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Commented May 29, 2021 at 14:26
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    @Joe: no offense but you couldn't be more wrong. As I said in my original post, I have no vested interest in this whatsoever, I am simply posting the facts as I know them. If you don't want to see what someone is like when there is a wealth of evidence that show the persons character then that's your choice. Let's all just ignore all the video evidence of her racism and celebrate her as the angel you seem to think she is. I personally will still strive to show the truth of the kind of person she is so people who want to support her do so knowing exactly what she actually stands for.
    – RightOfCentreUK
    Commented May 29, 2021 at 18:54
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    @Fredsbend: the link that says that the suspended account was created in May 2020 takes you to a Google cached version of the page and on the left it has a "joined date" of May 2020. It also shows around 75 tweets on the profile which is evidence that there are many more tweets on the there than the few shown on the cached page. Thanks for rolling back that change also as I felt I Shadur's edit did completely change the original intent of the answer. JoeW: is it so hard to believe that she would change her handle so much when trying to distance herself from the old account?
    – RightOfCentreUK
    Commented May 30, 2021 at 7:30

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