Why Taraji P. Henson is sending her son to Howard University instead of USC
WASHINGTON, D.C., native Taraji P. Henson is making headlines on Monday. The “Empire” star told Uptown Magazine that she’s planning to send her 20-year- old son, Marcel, to Howard University, a historically black school in D.C. — because she says he was racially profi led when he visited University of Southern California.
“My child has been racially profi led. He was in Glendale, California, and did exactly everything the cops told him to do, including letting them illegally search his car. It was bogus because they didn’t give him the ticket for what he was pulled over for,” she told the magazine.
“Then he’s at University of Southern California, the school that I was going to transfer him to, when police stopped him for having his hands in his pockets,” she said of her son, who attended a private high school in Los Angeles. “So guess where he’s going? Howard University. I’m not paying $ 50K so I can’t sleep at night wondering is this the night my son is getting racially profi led on campus.”
Henson also spoke out about a similar incident on Twitter during the trending # BlackLivesMatter hashtag earlier this year in the wake of Ferguson and several police brutality cases:
“Racial profi ling is VERY REAL!!! It has happened to me but to my son more and he is only 20!!! Something needs to be done. # SERIOUSLY” Henson also is a Howard University alum — the school enlisted her to be a grand marshal during the homecoming parade in 2013.
According to a Washington Post magazine profi le of the actress, Henson originally attended North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, pursuing a degree in electrical engineering. But after she failed precalculus, her father urged her to consider Howard’s theatre programme, since she dreamed of being an actress. — WPBloomberg