The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Two rappers facing felony gang charges appear with Trump in the Bronx
Ex-president invites Rappers Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow on stage.
NEW YORK — Former President Donald Trump, at his rally this week in the Bronx, invited two rappers on stage who have been charged in a sweeping gang case, with one of them facing attempted murder charges.
Michael Williams, better known as Sheff G, is a 25-year-old rapper whose songs and videos have millions of YouTube views and Spotify streams. He’s also a central figure in the gang case unveiled by Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez over a year ago, while he was serving a separate attempted weapons possession sentence.
Tegan Chambers, 24, who raps as Sleepy Hallow, has close to 11 million monthly listeners on Spotify. He faces conspiracy charges in the gang case. Both he and Sheff G have pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors say Sheff G’s money fueled and rewarded multiple shootings as members of the 8 Trey Crips and affiliated 9 Ways gang affiliates battled foes. He treated Sleepy
Hallow and others to a steak dinner to celebrate an October 2020 shooting that killed a purported member of a rival gang and injured five others, prosecutors say. Prosecutors also say Sheff G chauffeured three co-defendants to and from an
April 2021 shooting that targeted a gang rival but instead hit two bystanders.
Trump is trying to make inroads with Black Americans. AP VoteCast found Trump won just 8% of Black voters nationwide in 2020 versus 91% who voted for Joe Biden.
Trump has claimed that his criminal indictments have boosted his support among Black voters, comparing his legal challenges to anti-Black prejudice in the U.S. legal system.
At a rally on the Jersey Shore earlier this month, Trump was joined on stage by NFL Hall of Fame linebacker Lawrence Taylor, who pleaded guilty in New York in 2011 to misdemeanor criminal charges of sexual misconduct and is a registered sex offender.
U.S. Rep. Ritchie Torres, a Democrat who represents the Bronx in Congress, said it is an offensive strategy for Trump to associate with people who are accused of violent crimes in order to appeal to Black voters.
“The conflation of communities of color with criminality is a racist trope that Donald Trump repeats,” said Torres, who is Black.
Toward the end of his speech Thursday, Trump asked his supporters, “Does everybody know Sheff G? Where is Sheff G?” before also introducing Sleepy Hallow.
“One thing I want to say: They are always going to whisper your accomplishments and shout your failures. Trump is going to shout the wins for all of us,” Sheff G told the crowd before Sleepy Hallow moved to the microphone to utter Trump’s slogan “Make America Great Again.”
A spokesman for Trump’s campaign was asked about whether the campaign knew about the charges and whether it was the former president who sought the rappers’ support or the other way around.
Campaign spokesman Steven Cheung responded in an email: “As Sheff G said: ‘They always whisper your accomplishments and shout your failures.’”