bearkat42
Well-Known Member
With every news cycle focused on Donald J. Trump’s latest misstep, it’s easy to overlook the fact that his campaign has drawn record low support from African-Americans — and that this achievement, as it were, illuminates something worrisome within the Republican Party itself.
As usual, this year’s convention featured African-Americans playing highly specific public roles: as speakers, surrogates, attendees and delegation leaders; they delivered sermons in praise of God and Mr. Trump; spoke of black poverty, unemployment and jobs; and berated the Black Lives Matter movement, offering stringent promises of a swift return to “law and order.”
This black hyper-visibility was intentional, a symbolic corrective for the convention’s astonishing lack of diversity: Of the 2,472 delegates, only 18 were black. It is the lowest percentage on record, lower even than 1964, the year the party selected Barry Goldwater as its presidential nominee.
Since that disastrous campaign, the Republicans have at least talked about reconnecting with African-Americans. In 2013, the Republican National Committee rolled out its “Growth and Opportunity Project,” a critical self-assessment intended to prevent the party’s share of minority votes from slipping further.
The rise of Mr. Trump and his brand of racial populism has undermined nearly all the report’s recommendations on minority outreach. Among black voters, 90 to 94 percent hold unfavorable views of the nominee. By current polling accounts, he is winning between 4 to 9 percent of the black vote. Sally Bradshaw, one of Jeb Bush’s top advisers and a co-author of the 2013 report, recently announced that she was leaving the party, citing Republicans’ decision to nominate “a bigot.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/04/o...eal-with-black-voters.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0
As usual, this year’s convention featured African-Americans playing highly specific public roles: as speakers, surrogates, attendees and delegation leaders; they delivered sermons in praise of God and Mr. Trump; spoke of black poverty, unemployment and jobs; and berated the Black Lives Matter movement, offering stringent promises of a swift return to “law and order.”
This black hyper-visibility was intentional, a symbolic corrective for the convention’s astonishing lack of diversity: Of the 2,472 delegates, only 18 were black. It is the lowest percentage on record, lower even than 1964, the year the party selected Barry Goldwater as its presidential nominee.
Since that disastrous campaign, the Republicans have at least talked about reconnecting with African-Americans. In 2013, the Republican National Committee rolled out its “Growth and Opportunity Project,” a critical self-assessment intended to prevent the party’s share of minority votes from slipping further.
The rise of Mr. Trump and his brand of racial populism has undermined nearly all the report’s recommendations on minority outreach. Among black voters, 90 to 94 percent hold unfavorable views of the nominee. By current polling accounts, he is winning between 4 to 9 percent of the black vote. Sally Bradshaw, one of Jeb Bush’s top advisers and a co-author of the 2013 report, recently announced that she was leaving the party, citing Republicans’ decision to nominate “a bigot.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/04/o...eal-with-black-voters.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0
