U. of Oklahoma Investigates Student’s Ties to Racist Messages at Penn

The University of Oklahoma said on Friday evening that it had temporarily suspended a student while investigating whether he was involved in using a group-messaging app to send a series of racist text messages to black students at the University of Pennsylvania.

The messages — which Penn officials called “violent, racist, and thoroughly disgusting” and which included an invitation to a lynching — were sent to black freshmen at Penn though GroupMe, an app that allows users to include others in groups by adding their phone numbers. The messages appeared to originate with someone using the alias “Daddy Trump.” Of the people in the group, one appeared to be a University of Oklahoma student and another appeared to be an Oklahoma State University student, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

In an update to students, the University of Pennsylvania said David L. Boren, the University of Oklahoma’s president, reported that his institution had “determined from its preliminary inquiry that there’s a basis for a temporary suspension of the student under our student code while we continue to gather all of the facts.” He added: “It would appear this matter did not originate at the University of Oklahoma, but started elsewhere.”