Michele Morrow’s former campaign manager has been charged with posting images of a stranger online.
Jennifer Sloan Rachmuth, 54, of Apex, was charged on Saturday with one count of cyberstalking after police say she took photos of a woman at a Harris Teeter and posted them on her X account on Oct. 31 “for the purpose of terrifying, harassing, or embarrassing” the victim, according to warrants.
The photographs show a woman wearing a black-and-white keffiyeh and working in the bread section of the supermarket store. Keffiyehs are traditional Middle Eastern cotton headdresses that originated among nomadic Bedouin tribes. The black-and-white keffiyeh is widely used to symbolize solidarity with the Palestinian people.
In the post, Rachmuth refers to the woman as a “Hamas sympathizer” and claims that management urged her to leave when she inquired about it. The images Rachmuth took of the woman without her permission are still on her social media.
Filming or photographing persons in North Carolina is banned in private settings where citizens have a reasonable expectation of privacy, but it is legal in public. The inside of a store is considered private property, so it is up to individual stores to choose their policy on images and movies taken on their premises.
On November 3, Rachmuth announced on X that she had been detained.
“I believe the North Carolina Democratic Party is involved,” she stated after her detention. She did not explain how or why she feels the state Democratic Party is connected.
In her X profile, Rachmuth describes herself as an investigative journalist. She previously served as the campaign manager for Michele Morrow, the Republican candidate for state superintendent.
Rachmuth, who has a history of provocative rhetoric on social media, was replaced as campaign manager in or around June 2024, according to Media Matters for America.