Amber Phillips says American Airlines discriminated against her for being “fat and black.” (Photo: Courtesy of Amber Phillips)

A woman says that American Airlines called the police on her for flying while “fat and black.”

On Thursday, Amber Phillips, host of the podcast “The Black Joy Mixtape,” was flying from Durham, N.C., to her hometown of Washington, D.C., in a window seat of a 65-person plane. Space was so tight that when she placed her arm on the seat divider, it touched that of her fellow passenger.

“The passenger next to me, a white woman, made it clear with her body language that I was bothering her — she was aggressive when flipping her hair with her hand and fastening her seatbelt — and she was bullying me,” Phillips, 28, tells Yahoo Lifestyle.

The woman asked Phillips to move over. “I explained that I couldn’t move because I was in a window seat, and I said, ‘You are being mean to me. The world does not revolve around you.'” The woman responded by propping her left right on her leg so that the sole of her shoe was nearly touching Phillips. “I told her, ‘Don’t let the bottom of your shoe touch me.’”

The women spent most of the 60-minute flight in silence. Phillips accidentally dropped her headphones on the floor but fearful of making further contact, she didn’t reach for them. However, as the plane began its descent, Phillips began recording herself and her seatmate.

“When people practice discrimination, they do so because they believe people won’t tell on them,” says Phillips. “Shame keeps people like me from turning a light on it. But I deserve to exist. I deserve to fly. I didn’t deserve how I was treated.”

When the plane landed at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Phillips says the woman informed the flight attendant that she had been harassed by Phillips. Determined to get home without further incident, Phillips deplaned and boarded an airport shuttle on the tarmac, when suddenly an attendant instructed her to step off the bus.

When I decided to take a picture & video to document the incident, I deplaned, picked up my bag, and boarded the shuttle. While I'm on the shuttle, this woman LIED that I assaulted her and the @AmericanAir flight attendant called the cops to remove me from the shuttle bus. pic.twitter.com/czMyxkQVQ7 — amber j. phillips (@AmberJPhillips) April 27, 2018





“I was scared,” says Phillips. “My phone battery was dying and I was scanning the crowd trying to make eye contact with anyone who could help. A woman asked if I was OK and I said no. I gave her my phone number, asked her to record anything that happened next, and I got off the bus.”

Phillips was met by an officer from the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority Police Department who requested her ID. “As I was reaching for it, I asked, ‘Did you ask the other woman for her ID?’ He said, ‘No. And I don’t need your abuse.’”

Phillips handed over her passport, which she says the officer “snatched” (an exchange Phillips says was verified by a black tarmac worker) and then asked for a secondary form of ID. “He said he was investigating this as an assault,” says Phillips.

Soon, the gate manager and a second female officer arrived, and Phillips says, “I am here because my arm touched a white woman.” She added, “I told the police I was terrified and one said, ‘If you did nothing wrong, you shouldn’t be afraid.’”

Both women were ultimately allowed to leave after police had determined there was no wrongdoing, but the incident isn’t over for Phillips. Later that night, she tweeted about the experience in a thread that went completely viral.

I'm tired but in the morning, I'll tell you all how a white woman @AmericanAir flight attendant called the cops on me bc I made the white woman siting next to me uncomfortable bc my arm was touching hers on flight AA5580. The cops were called on me for flying while fat & Black. pic.twitter.com/9vc0PoFbX4 — amber j. phillips (@AmberJPhillips) April 27, 2018





This was my view tonight because I made a white woman uncomfortable and held her accountable by AT LEAST making sure I documented her outrageous behavior of trying to humiliate me on a flight. @AmericanAir put my life and the life of other passagers in danger tonight. pic.twitter.com/yf9iyuubFq — amber j. phillips (@AmberJPhillips) April 27, 2018



