April 5, 2019

Will Black Voters Keep Democrats From Going Too Far to the Left?

Which of the two dozen or so Democratic presidential candidates is going to carry black voters next year? The answer to that question is likely to be identical to the answer to the question “Which candidate is going to be the Democratic nominee, and maybe the president?”

Which of the two dozen or so Democratic presidential candidates is going to carry black voters next year? The answer to that question is likely to be identical to the answer to the question “Which candidate is going to be the Democratic nominee, and maybe the president?”

For years, black Americans have cast about 1 out of 4 votes in Democratic primaries. In 2016, they cast 71% of Democratic primary votes in Mississippi, 61% in South Carolina, 54% in Alabama, 51% in Georgia, 46% in Maryland, 32% in North Carolina and Tennessee, and 20 to 28% in Arkansas, Florida, Illinois, Virginia, New York, Michigan, Missouri and Ohio.

Near-unanimous black support helped nominate and elect the last three Democratic presidents — Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. It’s near-unanimous because black voters have tended to vote solidly for one candidate over another in the primaries, even against alternatives with serious claims on their support.

Such solidarity in voting makes sense for people identifying as part of a distinct group suffering discrimination. For years, political reporters have listened as black preachers, avoiding outright endorsements, called for “unity.” Their congregations understood what they meant.

Blacks have voted 85% or more Democratic in every presidential election since 1964; as well as in primaries for Jimmy Carter over Ted Kennedy in 1980; for Jesse Jackson in 1984 and 1988; for Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton in 2008; and for Clinton over Bernie Sanders in 2016.

If the impulse toward solidarity prevails again in 2020, it’s not clear who will benefit. Joe Biden, after eight years as the faithful vice president to the nation’s first black president, leads among black voters in current polls. But will he run?

The two candidates with African ancestry, Kamala Harris and Cory Booker, have background atypical of descendants of antebellum American slaves. Harris’ father is from Jamaica, and Booker grew up in an affluent black suburb in New Jersey. But then Barack Obama’s background was even more atypical: How many Americans grew up in Indonesia?

Plus, there are signs that black voters may not be behaving as monolithically as they used to. Exit polls in the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries showed them favoring Clinton pretty unanimously in the South, giving Sanders only 6 to 19% in former Confederate states. But in New York, Pennsylvania, five Great Lakes states and Missouri, Sanders got between 26 and 32%; he carried three of them and came within 2 points of carrying two more.

Chicago’s mayoral election is another example of waning black solidarity. Although Tuesday’s runoff was a contest between two black women, neither had carried the city’s 19 predominantly black wards in the nine-candidate Feb. 26 initial primary. Mayor-elect Lori Lightfoot’s electoral base was whites in upscale Lakefront wards, and her appeal was not connected to race but a lack of entanglement with corruption-tinged insiders.

Interestingly, even on race-related issues, white college graduates, not blacks, are now the most liberal segment of the Democratic electorate. As New York Times blogger Thomas Edsall notes, more white liberals (79%) than blacks (60%) believe that racial discrimination is the main reason many blacks can’t get ahead. Fully 32% of blacks say blacks who don’t are mostly responsible for that.

Black voters are generally more religious than whites, and much more than white liberals; they cast the deciding votes against same-sex marriage in California in 2008 and opposed it in North Carolina in 2012, changing their minds only after then-President Barack Obama endorsed it a day later. Indeed, blacks make up a large share of the diminishing number of Democratic primary voters labeling themselves as moderate or conservative.

Black Democrats seem less likely than white college-graduate liberals to support, and to identify as litmus tests, positions unpopular with most general election voters, like open-border immigration, ninth-month abortions and the Green New Deal. Perhaps they will prevent “woke” white college graduates — and a press almost entirely made up of this demographic — from pulling the Party too far to the left to defeat a Republican incumbent whose job approval seems stuck around 45%.

Or perhaps not. The Democratic Party, from its Jacksonian foundation in 1832, has always been a coalition of out-groups, of people not considered typical Americans. At their best, they’re a triumphant majority. At their worst, they’re a disorderly rabble. Which will they be in 2020? Black voters will have a big say in that.

COPYRIGHT 2019 CREATORS.COM

Who We Are

The Patriot Post is a highly acclaimed weekday digest of news analysis, policy and opinion written from the heartland — as opposed to the MSM’s ubiquitous Beltway echo chambers — for grassroots leaders nationwide. More

What We Offer

On the Web

We provide solid conservative perspective on the most important issues, including analysis, opinion columns, headline summaries, memes, cartoons and much more.

Via Email

Choose our full-length Digest or our quick-reading Snapshot for a summary of important news. We also offer Cartoons & Memes on Monday and Alexander’s column on Wednesday.

Our Mission

The Patriot Post is steadfast in our mission to extend the endowment of Liberty to the next generation by advocating for individual rights and responsibilities, supporting the restoration of constitutional limits on government and the judiciary, and promoting free enterprise, national defense and traditional American values. We are a rock-solid conservative touchstone for the expanding ranks of grassroots Americans Patriots from all walks of life. Our mission and operation budgets are not financed by any political or special interest groups, and to protect our editorial integrity, we accept no advertising. We are sustained solely by you. Please support The Patriot Fund today!


The Patriot Post and Patriot Foundation Trust, in keeping with our Military Mission of Service to our uniformed service members and veterans, are proud to support and promote the National Medal of Honor Heritage Center, the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, both the Honoring the Sacrifice and Warrior Freedom Service Dogs aiding wounded veterans, the National Veterans Entrepreneurship Program, the Folds of Honor outreach, and Officer Christian Fellowship, the Air University Foundation, and Naval War College Foundation, and the Naval Aviation Museum Foundation. "Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one's life for his friends." (John 15:13)

★ PUBLIUS ★

“Our cause is noble; it is the cause of mankind!” —George Washington

Please join us in prayer for our nation — that righteous leaders would rise and prevail and we would be united as Americans. Pray also for the protection of our Military Patriots, Veterans, First Responders, and their families. Please lift up your Patriot team and our mission to support and defend our Republic's Founding Principle of Liberty, that the fires of freedom would be ignited in the hearts and minds of our countrymen.

The Patriot Post is protected speech, as enumerated in the First Amendment and enforced by the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, in accordance with the endowed and unalienable Rights of All Mankind.

Copyright © 2024 The Patriot Post. All Rights Reserved.

The Patriot Post does not support Internet Explorer. We recommend installing the latest version of Microsoft Edge, Mozilla Firefox, or Google Chrome.