W.Va. official to return to work after racist Michelle Obama remark

A local West Virginia official is apparently set to return to work this month after being suspended from her job over a racist Facebook post about first lady Michelle Obama.

Pamela Taylor, director of the Clay County Development Corporation, was temporarily dismissed from her job in November after she compared Obama to an “ape” in a Facebook post intended to praise incoming first lady Melania Trump. She said, “It will be refreshing to have a classy, beautiful, dignified First Lady in the White House. I’m tired of seeing a Ape in heels.”

The inflammatory Facebook post led to an online firestorm, and Taylor was suspended from her job as a result. The post also led to the resignation of former Clay Mayor Beverly Whaling, who had commented that Taylor’s comment “just made my day.”

But the Charleston Gazette-Mail obtained a recent letter from the agency’s acting director, Leslie McGlothin, to the West Virginia Bureau of Senior Services that says Taylor is set to return to work on Dec. 23.

Yahoo News called the Clay County development organization, which provides services to low-income residents and senior citizens in Clay County, to confirm the report.

“I hate to tell you. She is not here and as far as her coming back, I don’t think the board had a meeting on it,” a woman who answered the phone said. She declined to provide either her name or position, or to redirect the call to another employee.

“No, you’re not putting my name in the paper,” she said. “They’ll tell you the same thing as me. The board has not met yet. We don’t know.”

When told that there were reports of Taylor returning to her job in late December, the agency’s employee said, “That’s old. That’s old news.”