A Black woman says she felt threatened after being harassed by a white man on an Amtrak train, and employees from the government agency did nothing to help her.
Nafís White says she was traveling from Boston to New York City on May 12 when the man seated in front of her in business class “accosted” her while she was returning to her seat from the restroom.
The next day, she posted a video of the encounter on her Instagram page.
White said he accused her of shaking his seat and opening a tray table, which she denied, telling the unidentified man that she had not moved the tray table at any point during the trip.
“My friend asked him why he was speaking to us rudely and he asked him why he had specifically targeted me. The man then turned around and violently pushed his seat all the way back in an attempt to hit my legs and invade my space,” White wrote on Instagram in the caption of a video showing part of the encounter.
White said the man kept staring at her and a friend seated next to her and refused to turn around, prompting her to start recording him for her “protection.”
The video first shows a white man raising his hand in front of her phone before pointing his phone back at her camera.
“You can film me back if you want, but you really don’t need to be antagonizing me,” White says. “That’s absolutely uncalled for, so I will film you until you turn around. This is so ridiculous.”
But instead of turning around, the man gets up from his seat, stands by the seat next to White, and continues to film her.
As the man inched closer to White, other passengers intervened and demanded that the man leave White alone. She asked the bystanders to get the conductor and call police.
“He’s going to get violent with me or something. He needs to be off this train,” White can be heard saying in the video.
“Ignore him,” advised one passenger. “Please get help,” White responded.
“I believed that he was moving towards me to further frighten me and physically harm me,” White added in the caption.
White said some passengers made calls to Amtrak to try to find the conductors. In the meantime, White said the man stood between the car where she was seated and the next, near the exit doors and kept “motioning me with his hands to come to him, the kind of motion you see on martial arts films when one person wants to fight another. I did not move from my seat,” she wrote.
When a conductor did arrive, White said he spoke to the man, but he never addressed her or communicated with any of the witnesses. So, while departing the train, she asked the same conductor for the man’s name and contact information. The conductor reportedly told her that the man was justified in his response because she was shaking his seat and pulling the tray table, which White said were “falsehoods.”
Believing the white man’s word over the Black woman, the conductor refused to escalate her situation to his superiors or give White the contact information to file a complaint, she said.
Nearly 14,000 people viewed White’s video on Instagram, many tagging and calling out Amtrak for the staff’s lack of support for the woman and applauding her on her ability to remain calm during the encounter with the man.
“Your composure throughout is so impressive…,” wrote one user.
Another added, “I am so sorry this happened! What a terrifying time, especially in this day and age of concealed carry. I’m so thankful you were supported by your friend and strangers. It’s heartening that people stood up for you. But still- it should not have been necessary. Hugs and love.”
Some called for the conductor to be fired, but White said she wouldn’t want the conductor to lose his job; she is calling for additional training instead.
But as far as the other passenger who allegedly harassed her: “The attacker needs to be barred for life,” she wrote.
