Tamika Mallory said the pilot of her American Airlines flight from Miami to New York on Sunday kicked her off of the plane after she got into an argument with a gate agent
A New York activist and Women’s March co-founder was kicked off of a flight on Sunday after a dispute over seats.
Tamika Mallory said the pilot of her American Airlines flight from Miami to New York on Sunday told her to get off the plane after she got into an argument with a gate agent.
She claims she was racially-profiled and has slammed airline staff for trying to ‘intimidate’ her.
‘It definitely was white male aggression,’ she told the New York Daily News.
‘I was singled out, I was disrespected, and he was trying to intimidate me. I was discriminated against.’
Mallory, who was one of the founders of the Women’s March on Washington and who is active in the gun control and civil rights movements, was visiting Miami with friends to see the Revolt Music Conference.
After an argument with a gate agent about a changed seat, Mallory said she was pulled to the side by the pilot who told her she was acting disrespectfully. Then, when she got onto the plane and started settling in, she said he called her to the front and kicked her off
She claims she was racially-profiled and has slammed airline staff for trying to ‘intimidate’ her. Mallory is seen above speaking at a Womens Action Network event in September
Mallory, who was one of the founders of the Women’s March on Washington and who is active in the gun control and civil rights movements, was visiting Miami with friends to see the Revolt Music Conference
She then planned to attend the wedding of Reverend Al Sharpton’s daughter on Sunday afternoon, but missed it because she was not allowed on her flight.
When she got to the airport, Mallory said she used an airport kiosk to change from a middle to an aisle seat.
But when she arrived to the gate she was issued a new ticket that put her back in the middle.
Not wanting to sit in that seat, she asked an agent why her seat had been changed.
She says the staff member then responded in a ‘nasty’ and ‘disrespectful’ way.
Though frustrated and still stuck in a middle seat, she assumed the dispute with the customers service representative was over, until she was approached by a pilot who overheard the exchange.
The pilot, who hasn’t been named, told Mallory that the gate-worker had ‘nothing to do’ with her seat being changed, and told her that she had been the one who acted disrespectfully.
‘Then he said to me, “Can you get on this flight? Are you going to be on a problem on this flight?”‘ she recounted.
‘I said, “No, I’m not. Actually I’m fine. But I will write my complaint down.” He looked at me and said, “You’re going to get yourself a one-way ticket off this plane.”‘
Put off, Mallory was allowed on the plane and was settling into her middle seat when she heard her name being called over the loud-speaker.
The pilot was requesting that she come to the front of the plane, and when she got there, she was told she was being removed.
‘I began to express my outrage,’ Mallory told the Daily News.
‘Then I asked why I was being removed. I asked why this was happening to me. I told him I felt completely disrespected. I began to weep.’
She said she was never offered any sort of explanation, but that cops eventually arrived and Mallory walked off the plane.
The person she was traveling with, who stayed seated until his name was called to the front, was also removed with no explanation.
The showdown, Mallory believes, was a way for the white male pilot to assert his dominance over a young, black, female passenger.
‘Doesn’t matter how much we do and how hard we fight, white men are allowed to treat black women like s***,’ she wrote on Twitter after the incident.
‘Other ppl (sic) stand by and watch it happen because it doesn’t affect them. If I have to fight alone, @AmericanAir will NEVER GET AWAY W/ THIS.’
She said she was never offered any sort of explanation, but that cops eventually arrived and Mallory walked off the plane. The showdown, Mallory believes, was a way for the white male pilot to assert his dominance over a young, black, female passenger
Mallory also wrote on Twitter that she has spoken to multiple American Airlines representatives, all of whom say that the pilot was in the wrong
American Airlines spokesman James Freed said that the company doesn’t ‘tolerate discrimination of any kind,’ when asked about the incident (stock image)
After sharing her story to Twitter, Mallory said a company representative re-booked her on a Sunday evening flight, but she was still never given an explanation as to why she was booted off of the flight in the first place.
Mallory also wrote on Twitter that she has spoken to multiple American Airlines representatives, all of whom say that the pilot was in the wrong.
‘Every @AmericanAir rep I’ve talked to told me the pilot mishandled the situation. He had no business getting involved in a seat dispute,’ she wrote.
She also took to Facebook live to share her full experience and her outrage at being singled out in such a public manner when she got home on Sunday night.
American Airlines spokesman James Freed said that the company doesn’t ‘tolerate discrimination of any kind,’ when asked about the incident.
‘We take these allegations seriously, and we are in the process of reaching out to our colleagues in Miami, as well as Ms Mallory, to obtain additional information on what transpired during the boarding process,’ Freed told the Daily News.