A northern Minnesota mother — who gained widespread attention after being seen in a playground video in which she used a racial slur and made an obscene gesture — has raised almost $670,000, with the amount growing rapidly, on a faith-based crowdfunding platform, GiveSendGo. Along with accepting donations, GiveSendGo allows people to click a “pray button” to let the campaign owners know they are praying for them.

In the video, Shiloh Hendrix, carrying one of her children in a Rochester, Minnesota, park playground, is filmed by a man who berates her for using a racial slur against a child. Ms. Hendrix retorts that the child tried to steal from her diaper bag. As the quarrel progresses, Ms. Hendrix eventually makes an obscene gesture at the man and says “the n word” multiple times and walks off.  

On her fundraising page, Ms. Hendrix appears to acknowledge insulting the child. “I recently had a kid steal from my 18 month old son’s diaper bag at a park,” she says on the fundraising page. “I called the kid out for what he was.”

She says her personal information has been disseminated, including her Social Security number.

The man who recorded the video, Sharmake Omar, tells NBC News he saw the woman berating the child of Somali heritage at the Rochester park. Mr. Omar says he knows the boy’s parents, who came to Minnesota from Somalia, and that the child is on the autism spectrum.

Ms. Hendrix says reaction to videos of the incident have put her family into a “very dire situation.” She says she may need to relocate because “my family members are being attacked” and her eldest child may not be going back to school.

“We cannot, and will not live in fear,” Ms. Hendrix says.

The Rochester branch of the NAACP has hosted its own fundraiser for the family of the 5-year-old boy. The group called the incident an “intentional racist, threatening, hateful and verbal attack against a child.” Its GoFundMe was ended after raising more than $340,000, just more than half of what Ms. Hendrix has raised.

The Rochester Police Department said on Monday it’s concluded its investigation of the matter, and that the Rochester City Attorney’s Office will now decide if any charges will be filed. “We acknowledge the significant impact this incident has had on those directly involved and on the broader community,” the police department said in a release. “We ask for the community’s patience as the legal review continues.”

Minnesota has, for years, welcomed a large number of international refugees, most notably Somalis. A social welfare group, Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, estimates that there are more than 82,000 Somalis in the state. Representative Ilhan Omar, a prominent member of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s far-left “Squad,” who was born in Somalia, is the first African refugee to become a member of Congress.

The large number of Somali refugees in the state — many of whom have set down permanent roots — have created tensions and become part of the national political conversation. When Vice President Harris announced Governor Walz as her pick on her presidential ticket, Minnesota’s immigration situation entered the national conversation.

An advisor to President Trump, Stephen Miller, claimed in a Fox New interview that Mr. Walz planned to “turn the entire Midwest into Mogadishu.”

Mr. Trump also repeatedly singled out Somali immigrants in pre-election rallies. He signed an executive order on inauguration day canceling the arrival of thousands of refugees who were approved to immigrate to America, including to Minnesota.

The Somali community in Minnesota — mostly in Minneapolis — has come under scrutiny over ties to a Somali terror group, Al-Shabaab, which is considered resourceful and dangerous. In recent years, several young Somali men have traveled back to Somalia to join the insurgents’ battle for control of Somalia, a failed state. Al-Shabaab has targeted American forces inside Somalia and declared its hostility to the U.S., but so far the only places it’s attacked outside of Somalia are nextdoor Kenya and Djibouti.

The contretemps around Ms. Hendrix is a sign that the situation regarding Somali refugees in Minnesota remains on the national radar. Ms. Hendrix’s fundraiser has received more than 24,000 donations. Many are small amounts of $5 to $10 from anonymous donors. “The overwhelming support that my family and myself have received is unbelievable,” Ms. Hendrix says in an update.

“We have to keep fighting for the safety of all our families, not just mine,” Ms. Hendrix says.

GiveSendGo is no stranger to controversial fundraisers, and has been the go-to fundraising destination for white people who’ve gotten into legal trouble in racially charged cases. The platform raised seven-figure sums for Kyle Rittenhouse and Daniel Penny. But recently it has hosted a campaign — one that has raised more than half a million dollars — for 17-year-old Karmelo Anthony, who’s charged with murder in the stabbing death of a student athlete, Austin Metcalf, also 17, at a track meet last month. Mr. Anthony is black while Metcalf is white.