Admits she was ‘biologically born white’
After repeated questions by the hosts of The Real, Dolezal admits she is a white woman who was born to white parents.
I acknowledge that I was biologically born white to white parents, but I identify as black. Why not give me the right to identify, how I identify? I think we’re all entitled to be exactly who we are and to identify as such.
Says ‘No biological proof’ parents are hers
When presented with a birth certificate on NBC News, Dolezal says Larry and Ruthanne Dolezal may not be her parents:
I haven’t had a DNA test. There’s been no biological proof that Larry and Ruthanne are my biological parents. I’m not necessarily saying that I can prove they’re not. But I don’t know that I can actually prove they are…Nothing about being white describes who I am. The closest thing that I can come to is if — if you’re black or white, I’m black. I’m more black than I am white.
Told to quit Ombudsman position
Mayor Condon calls for Dolezal to resign from her chairpersonship of the Office of the Police Ombudsman Commission. A city report states that she has failed to safeguard secret information and talks about it publicly, among several violations. Report findings:
Commissioner Dolezal engaged in conduct that humiliated, insulted or degraded…While working for the commission, she was simultaneously protesting police violence and speaking out about recent police cases involving violence against blacks.
Training incident details:
[She] asked questions that were, ‘hostile and accusatory,’ specifically inquiring if all the suspects in the training scenarios were black. When told that the first scenario of training had included only white suspects, she turned her body away from the officers and busied herself with her cellphone.
Parents reject childhood account
Dolezal’s parents say that her comments about painting her face with crayon are false. Mother:
That didn’t happen. We were very much in touch with her during her childhood and during those years, and we did not ever see any kind of representation of her, nor her teachers at school, of that kind of items. It’s not rational.
It’s disappointing to see that Rachel is still making false statements… I was hoping to see a change.
Family say Dolezal not black
Dolezal’s parents, who say they are estranged from their daughter, accuse her of lying about her racial idenity. They say she began to “disguise herself” in 2006 or 2007, after the family had adopted four African-American children and Dolezal had shown an interest in portrait art. Mother:
It’s very sad that Rachel has not just been herself. Her effectiveness in the causes of the African-American community would have been so much more viable, and she would have been more effective if she had just been honest with everybody.
When asked about her racial identity by a local reporter, Dolezal responds:
That question is not as easy as it seems. There’s a lot of complexities … and I don’t know that everyone would understand that. We’re all from the African continent.
