Ousted US employee Sherrod plans to sue blogger

SAN DIEGO – A woman who was ousted from her job at the Agriculture Department said last week she will sue a conservative blogger who posted an edited video of her making racially tinged remarks last week.

The edited video posted by Andrew Breitbart led Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to ask Shirley Sherrod to resign, a decision he reconsidered after seeing the entire video of her March speech to a local NAACP civil rights group. In the full speech, Sherrod spoke of racial reconciliation and lessons she learned after initially hesitating to help a white farmer save his home.

She said she doesn’t want an apology from Breitbart for posting the video that took her comments out of context, but told a crowd at the National Association of Black Journalists annual convention that she would “definitely sue.”

Vilsack and President Barack Obama later called Sherrod to apologize for her hasty ouster. Vilsack has offered her a new job at the department, which she is still considering.

“I have many, many questions before I can make a decision,” Sherrod told the group. “I don’t know what will happen from this day forward in terms of whether I’ll be back in the department or what I’ll do.”

E-mails to Breitbart’s Web sites seeking comment were not immediately returned Thursday morning.

Obama said last Thursday morning on the daytime talk show “The View” that the incident shows racial tensions still exist in America.

“There are still inequalities out there. There’s still discrimination out there,” Obama said. “But we’ve made progress.”

Obama pinned much of the blame for the incident on a media culture that he said seeks out conflict and doesn’t always get the facts right. But he added, “A lot of people overreacted, including people in my administration.”