Diamond and Silk

Ineitha Lynnette Hardaway (November 25, 1971 – January 8, 2023) and Herneitha Rochelle Hardaway Richardson (born January 17, 1971), known as Diamond and Silk, respectively, were a pair of American conservative political commentators and vloggers.

They are known for their support of former U.S. president Donald Trump.

Both have served as contributors for conservative news channel Newsmax.

Hardaway and Richardson were registered as Democrats as of 2012.

Their first YouTube videos were a montage about police brutality, titled "Black Lives Matter" (which received 17,000 views), and a video about Sandra Bland, a black woman who died in a Texas jail (it received 32,000 views).

After the pair began to make pro-Trump videos, their YouTube channel started to grow considerably.

Although not officially affiliated with the Trump campaign, they urged support for Trump via social media efforts and rallies and traveled to three states for the campaign.

The two women first joined Donald Trump as the "Stump for Trump Girls" on stage at his Raleigh, North Carolina, rally on December 4, 2015.

The duo received media attention during the 2016 presidential campaign of Trump and again in April 2018 when Facebook notified them they were "unsafe to the community".

In response, they publicly complained that Facebook blocked and censored their Facebook page.

They later warmed up the crowd at the Trump rally on January 2, 2016, in Biloxi, Mississippi.

They initiated a "Ditch and Switch" campaign to encourage Democrats to register as Republicans and created a website explaining to voters which states had closed primaries and when the deadlines were for changing party affiliations.

On November 2, 2016, Diamond and Silk appeared with Lara Trump, wife of Eric Trump, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, on behalf of the Trump campaign.

They were paid $1,274.94 for field consulting work by the Trump campaign.

Following the controversial Unite the Right rally held in Charlottesville, Virginia, on August 11 and 12, 2017, Hardaway and Richardson, appearing on Fox & Friends, were critical of protesters on both sides in the event.

Hardaway criticized Neo-Nazi groups and the Ku Klux Klan for "spewing hate and ... creating violence" declaring "all of them should be condemned and denounced. Period".

In the same interview, she also said she does not "like Black Lives Matter and Antifa."

They further noted that they feel statues of Civil War Confederate soldiers should be kept in museums.

On April 26, 2018, at Congressman Steve King's invitation, they testified in front of Congress about their removal from Facebook.

Subsequently, Republican members of Congress brought up the two women's censorship claims at Mark Zuckerberg's testimony before Congress.

They regularly appeared on Fox News shows including Hannity, Fox News Sunday, Watters' World, The Ingraham Angle, and Fox & Friends. In November 2018, Diamond and Silk were given a show on Fox Nation, the online Fox News streaming service.

They were covered on ABC's Nightline.

Hardaway was notably more talkative during their appearances, while Richardson often just expressed agreement.

A documentary film by Hardaway and Richardson titled Dummycrats premiered in October 2018 at the Trump International Hotel Washington, D.C.

In May 2019, during a Fox & Friends appearance, Diamond and Silk claimed that then Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi was a "non-functioning alcoholic" who "slurs her words."

This was in reference to a doctored and slowed down video that appeared to show her slurring her words.

Shortly thereafter, Fox & Friends had to clarify for its viewers that the video was manipulated.

In 2019, Diamond and Silk appeared in a Trump 2020 re-election advertisement where they gave a pitch for his re-election.

At the same time, Diamond and Silk had a weekly show on Fox News' streaming service.

In April 2020, the two were terminated from Fox News for questioning the legitimacy of COVID-19 data.

On January 8, 2023, Diamond died at her home in North Carolina from heart disease at 51 years of age.

Silk has continued her political commentary under the "Diamond and Silk" name despite Diamond's death.

Hardaway and Richardson were sisters.

They were born as Ineitha Lynette Hardaway and Herneitha Rochelle Hardaway; however, they both went by their middle names.

They had three other siblings.

Their parents were Freeman and Betty Willis Hardaway, televangelical pastors based in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

Freeman and Betty Hardaway sold purported weight-loss cures and wreaths to ward off witchcraft.

For a fee of $50, Betty wrote the names of customers in a Bible, telling customers that this would make God answer their prayers.

Beginning in March 2020, Hardaway and Richardson questioned various information about COVID-19 including whether or not the number of deaths from the pandemic was being inflated to make Donald Trump look incompetent.

These questions led to the termination of their work with Fox News in April.