Rep. Jennifer A. Kiggans (R-VA) agreed with a radio host after he used a racially-charged term to attack House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) because he spoke out about Virginia redistricting efforts.
Kiggans reportedly made the remarks this week during an interview with Richmond’s Morning News.
“If Hakeem Jeffries wants to be involved in Virginia politics, then I suggest he does what a bunch of New Yorkers are doing. Leave New York, move down here to Virginia, run for office down here. You can represent us, if not, get your cotton-picking and hands off of Virginia,” the show’s host told Kiggans.
“That’s right. Ditto, yes. Yes, to that,” the Republican lawmaker replied.
The phrase “cotton-picking hands” carries deeply offensive racial connotations rooted in the history of American slavery and racial exploitation.
The term originates from the brutal reality of enslaved Black Americans forced to pick cotton on Southern plantations, work that was backbreaking, physically damaging, and performed under conditions of extreme suffering and inhumanity. When used colloquially—often in phrases like “keep your cotton-picking hands off”—the expression invokes this traumatic history, reducing Black people to the dehumanizing labor they were forced to endure and perpetuating stereotypes about Black bodies being suited only for manual servitude.
The phrase became embedded in American vernacular as a casual insult, with speakers often unaware of or indifferent to its connection to slavery and racial degradation. Critics argue that continued use of the term, even in seemingly innocuous contexts, normalizes references to slavery and keeps alive the association between Black people and exploitative labor, making it a jarring reminder of systemic racism and the lasting legacy of chattel slavery in American culture.
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