Donald Trump isn’t doing that great with black voters. He doesn’t need to

A view of the crowd that attended a roundtable discussion with Donald Trump at a Black church in Detroit. (Source: Bloomberg/Getty Images)

Donald Trump couldn’t fill a Black church in Detroit with Black supporters, but his message is resonating with enough African American voters to cost President Joe Biden a second term.

While there has been debate about just how strong Trump is among this key demographic — it’s anywhere from 14% to 23% depending on the poll — it is clear that there has been a slight demographic shift. A mini-Blexit of sorts. And Trump, in elevating traditional Black Republicans, hammering Biden on crime, immigration and the economy, has landed on a matrix of issues that unites Black conservatives and enervates traditional Black Democrats. This strategy won’t net Trump the record numbers among African Americans that he and his allies tout, but, so far, so good.

Take Florida Representative Byron Donalds. While liberals rightly scoffed at his (ahistorical and incorrect) suggestion that Black families were better off in the Jim Crow era, his rhetoric is textbook Black conservatism. It is MAGA, which at its core is a nostalgic re-writing of history, in blackface. Black Republicans, who have traditionally been about 10% of the Black vote, have long believed in a kind of mythic past, shorn of racism, that was ripped asunder by Democrats and the Great Society. Donalds, who defended his comments across multiple cable news shows with Black hosts, understands his assignment — galvanizing Black Republicans and giving Black Democrats and independents pause. Donalds, along with former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, were with Trump at the Detroit event. Both have made Trump’s shortlist of possible ticket mates, along with South Carolina Senator Tim Scott. Scott’s SuperPAC will spend $14 million to reach Black and young voters over the next months.

“Donald Trump thinks the fact that he has ‘many Black friends’ excuses an entire lifetime of denigrating and disrespecting Black Americans, but Black voters know better—and Trump’s 11th hour attempt at Black ‘outreach’ isn’t fooling anyone,” Jasmine Harris, the Biden campaign’s director of Black media, said in a statement in response to Trump’s Detroit outing.

Trump’s “many black friends” now include former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, whose 28-year prison sentence for public corruption was commuted by Trump in 2020. Model, rapper and television personality Amber Rose also announced her intention to support Trump. And more significantly, rapper Cardi B, who memorably interviewed and supported Biden in 2020, said she won’t back the president in 2024, citing his support of the wars in Israel and Ukraine.

“I feel like people got betrayed,” Cardi B said in an interview with Rolling Stone. “It’s just like, damn, y’all not caring about nobody. Then, it really gets me upset that there is solutions to it. There is a solution. I know there’s a solution.”

Speaking of Biden and Trump, Cardi B said, in her colorful way, that she didn’t rock with either.

It is this kind of false equivalency mindset among this kind of voter more broadly that is especially troubling for Biden’s campaign. If Trump and Biden are equally bad, what’s the point of voting?

While Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have dialed up their Black voter outreach, it isn’t nearly enough. The bar is low for Trump and high for Biden. It’s not fair but it’s reality. Biden is smart to amplify Trump’s authoritarian rhetoric and his racism. At an event in Philadelphia he pointedly asked the crowd to re-imagine Jan. 6.

“What would’ve happened if Black Americans had stormed the Capitol? I don’t think he’d be talking about pardons,” Biden said. “This is the same guy who wanted to tear gas you as you peacefully protested George Floyd’s murder. It’s the same guy who still calls the ‘Central Park Five’ guilty, even though they were exonerated. He’s that landlord who denies housing applications because of the color of your skin. He’s that guy who won’t say Black lives matter and invokes neo-Nazi, Third Reich terms.”

But Biden and his allies must make it clear to Black voters that a Trump victory in November is also a victory for Trump’s mob. Biden, in marking the third anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection, talked in detail about how Trump empowered a violent mob. Do Black Americans want to empower that mob? Do they want their children to live in a country where that mob is pardoned and elevated and has a seat at the table? As one Democratic strategist who frequently does focus groups with young African American voters texted me, “political and racial violence scares black folks more than losing democracy.”

“Trump is doing ‘stand back and stand by’ antagonizing on every stage every night and Black folks need to know it,” said the strategist, who asked that his name not be used in order to speak candidly.

He was referring to comments Trump made at the first presidential debate in September 2020. When asked whether he condemned White supremacists and military groups, Trump said, “Proud Boys — stand back and stand by.”

There is another reality the Biden team must face. The president is not the best surrogate for his own campaign. He has never been a great orator and he appears physically older, and frankly slower in terms of pace, than he did four years ago. While he is one of the smartest and most experienced people to hold the office and has an impressive legislative record, he has trouble conveying strength and command because he’s 81. And that’s what voters, increasingly susceptible to altered videos and misinformation, see.  I’ve written before that people like Texas Representative Jasmine Crockett should be a top surrogate. Centering the voices of average African American voters who have had student loans forgiven, started small businesses or are saving money on insulin because the administration lowered prescription drug prices is also necessary. Harris has been having off-the-record roundtables with prominent Black men— comedian D.L. Hughley went from Harris critic to being a proud advocate after meeting with her in November.

There are other Black men with big followings who they should also court—Shannon Sharpe, Stephen A. Smith and Charlamagne tha God.

And the White House needs to get Cardi B on the phone and convince her to change her mind.

The Biden team and affiliated groups have started much earlier than in the past and are spending more money. This is good. Next week, the Black Collective Pac, the largest organization supporting Black candidates, will kick off a drive across 10 states to register 250,000 African American voters. They aim to connect with micro-influencers and content creators like the rapper Plies on social media—according to a recent survey of 2,000 Black voters, 20% get most of their political news from social media.

The playing field for reaching Black voters has changed dramatically over the last decades — Black churches have waned in importance, there is a widespread misinformation campaign and Black media is much more diffuse than it was in the days of Tom Joyner. And 2024 isn’t 2020, a once in a lifetime pandemic election cycle. This campaign cycle is much more like 2016, where apathy among key demographic groups helped Trump win the White House. It could easily happen again.

Credit: Bloomberg