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      in Elections

      Biden got a lift from young Black Americans on the road to victory

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      Joe Biden almost dropped out of the race to become the Democratic presidential nominee this year after several disappointing results in early voting states – until Black voters in South Carolina delivered him a resounding win.And while the race between Biden and Donald Trump remained too close to call on Thursday evening, it appears Black Americans once again stepped up to give the Democrat the backbone of his support, especially in key battleground states including Georgia, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.Record turnout among African American voters could be the difference between a Biden win and a Biden loss.“What we’re all re-learning, both the pundits in DC and uninspired Black voters, is the value of our net worth when we show up at the ballot box,” said Antjuan Seawright, a Democratic strategist in South Carolina. “Even when we’re suppressed, depressed, or misinformed, we still show up.”Even when we’re suppressed, we still show upAccording to exit poll data, Black voters overwhelmingly backed the Democratic candidate by a margin of 87% to Donald Trump’s 12%. But Seawright had “been saying Black voters will decide the election since 2017”, last predicting South Carolina’s loyal Black moderates would propel Biden to victory in the state’s February Democratic primary.With ballots still being counted, mail-in or absentee ballots from Democratic-leaning counties, most with large Black populations, are likely to be the deciding factor in who becomes the next US president, amplifying the power of the Black electorate.Analysts pinpoint a surge in turnout among young people of all races, but especially Black Americans.Early voting data already showed young people turning out in record numbers, and with four in 10 eligible Black voters being millennials or from generation Z, the push in urban centers like Philadelphia, Atlanta and Detroit was critical for Biden.“Every major movement in this country has been fueled by young people and Black people on the frontlines defining what change looks like,” Seawright said. “This election is going to be defined as a movement election for the American experiment.”As racial justice protests ignited throughout the country this summer after the killing of George Floyd by police in Minnesota in May – then accelerated with the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in August – Americans took sides divided mostly along racial lines. More

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      in US Politics

      Black women shed blood, sweat and tears to gain a voice. Granny, this vote is for you

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      With my hand on the pearls she gave me as graduation gift, I said a prayer, shed a tear and said her name: “Granny, this vote is for you.”
      Ms Rose won’t be here to see the returns come in later today, whatever the outcome might eventually be. Like many of the Black and indigenous women whose blood, sweat, and tears form the foundations of this country, she didn’t live to experience the full promise of this great experiment known as America.
      Granny died two weeks before election day.
      For nearly half her 98 years, Ms Rose was ineligible to vote – subject to a society that deemed women who looked like her worthy of being silenced. Even after the 19th amendment gave white women the right to vote, Black women remained disenfranchised.
      Neither the 19th nor the 15th amendment, which granted Black men their rights a century prior, addressed voter suppression in the form of Jim Crow laws that perpetuated segregation, legalized discrimination and barred Black communities from voting through poll taxes and literacy tests, or just plain threats of violence.
      Born in 1922 – two years after women’s suffrage – she entered a world in which Black women were “pulled in two directions”: fighting alongside Black men for racial equality and White counterparts for women’s rights, all while relegated as inferior and excluded within both movements.
      But in 1967, Granny put herself and her family on a journey, escaping the violence of Jim Crow and patriarchy in Arkansas to forge a new life in Wisconsin, a journey taken by hundreds of thousands of Black Americans who fled discrimination in the south during the Great Migration for better opportunity of the north.
      For Black journalists, our commitments to tell these stories would not be possible without the sacrifice of women like her. More

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      in US Politics

      How a Republican plan to split a Black college campus backfired

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      She didn’t know it at the time, but when Jonezie Cobb first set foot on North Carolina A&T State’s 13,000-person campus as a freshman last fall, the university was split in two.
      In 2016, Republican state legislators had drawn a line down Laurel Street, which runs through the middle of campus, effectively dividing the nation’s largest historically black university into separate congressional districts.
      Walking from the library to the dining hall, Cobb would frequently cross from the state’s sixth district over into the 13th, both represented by white Republicans: Mark Walker and Ted Budd.
      Cobb, now a sophomore, remembers first learning about the distinct districts from student groups that were organizing calls, protests and even a visit to Walker and Budd’s offices in Washington DC. However, after a court decision late last year, for the first time since 2012, the university’s students will be voting in a general election under the umbrella of a single district.
      The newly minted sixth district, which includes all of A&T as well as the largely Black cities of Winston-Salem and Greensboro, is one of two North Carolina congressional seats likely to flip in favor of Democrats in the election. In the other – the state’s second district – Republican incumbent representative George Holding announced after the 2019 redistricting that he would not be seeking reelection.
      Cobb, who is 19 and studying political science, cast her vote on the first day of early voting at a polling station on campus. The station itself was another fight – last fall, dozens of A&T students packed the county’s board of elections meetings to lobby for a voting site at the university, a request that was eventually granted.
      These forms of suppression, intentional or not, made voting feel even more important, Cobb said.
      “As African Americans we pride ourselves in voting, because that’s what our ancestors fought for,” she said. “It’s something that I will never forget.”
      More than 37,000 people aged 18-29 have already voted in the sixth district, nearly twice the tally recorded in 2016. Statewide, of the 3.3m votes cast, 12% have come from Cobb’s age group, up more than a point over 2016.
      Rachel Weber, the North Carolina press secretary for voting advocacy group NextGen America, said she believes the uptick can be explained by young people feeling the effects of the political world on their day-to-day lives more than ever.
      “We have lived through four years of an administration that has attacked the issues near and dear to our hearts, whether it be racial justice or affordable healthcare,” Weber said. “Politics are closer to young people right now.”
      Students at A&T rallying against racially biased districting and maps “that don’t represent us and where we live” is a prime example of the youth activism and political engagement endemic in the current election, she added.
      A&T has a long history of organizing around politics and racial justice: the Greensboro Four – the group of Black activists whose sit-ins in 1960 at a local department store helped further the civil rights movement – were all students at the university.
      But in the past year, gerrymandering has been added to the list of seemingly evergreen conversation topics on campus that include economic inequality, criminal justice reform and systemic racism, said Derick Smith, a political science lecturer at the university.
      “[Students] became personally aware and highly agitated that they were being targeted by this particular suppression method,” Smith said. “They felt like diluting their voice and their vote was criminal.”
      The 2016 move to split the campus came after Republican legislators were forced to remake North Carolina’s congressional maps after a US supreme court ruling deemed the previous ones unconstitutionally gerrymandered. More

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      in US Politics

      A win for Joe Biden would only scratch the surface of America’s afflictions | John Mulholland

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      On 18 September, the first day of early voting in the US, Jason Miller, a house painter from Minneapolis, became, according to the Washington Post, one of the first people in the country to vote. He cast his vote for Joe Biden, saying: “I’ve always said that I wanted to be the first person to vote against Donald Trump. For four years, I have waited to do this.” Close to 90 million people have already voted in the US and it is on track to record the highest turnout since 1908.We can thank Donald Trump for that, a man who attracts fierce loyalty from his supporters but who energises his opponents in equal measure. The country has been fixated by the White House occupant for the past four years. But there is a danger that progressives and liberals invest too much faith in Trump’s departure and too little in what will be needed to fix America. Getting rid of Trump might be one thing, fixing America is another.If the president loses, there will be much talk of a new normality and the need for a democratic reset. Hopes will be voiced for a return to constitutional norms. There will be calls for a return of civility in public discourse and a healing of the partisan divide that scars America. All of that is as it should be. But it ought to come with a recognition that America was broken long before it elected Trump and his departure would be no guarantee that the country will be mended. Many of the systemic issues that afflict the US predate Trump.His ugly and dysfunctional presidency has distracted from many of the fundamentals that have beset America for decades, even centuries. But they remain stubbornly in place. If he does lose, America will no longer have Trump to blame. Two two-term Democratic presidents over the past 30 years have not significantly affected the structural issues that corrode US democracy and society, and race is always at their heart. The past few months have drawn further attention to the systemic racism and brutality that characterise much policing. But racism in the States is not confined to the police. In fact, it is not confined at all. More

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      in US Politics

      'I can have a voice': Latino voters set for decisive role in key Arizona county

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      Even before she could vote, Imelda Quiroz Beltran had a goal for this election: to register as many Latino voters in Maricopa county as possible – and make sure they cast their ballots.
      Every day for months, she has gone door to door with the non-profit Mi Familia Vota, undeterred by the searing desert sun – zipping across Phoenix’s sprawling concrete-paved neighborhoods in search of eligible voters.
      And then the day came when Beltran registered herself – after she became a naturalized citizen this year.
      “Finally, I can have a voice,” she said. “And this year, it is so important that we all have a voice.”
      Maricopa – which includes Phoenix – is the fastest-growing county in the US. Of its nearly 4.5 million residents, one-third identify as Latino, according to census data.
      While Arizona has voted for the Republican presidential nominee in every election but one since 1952, this year, political strategists and pollsters are predicting that Latino voters in Maricopa could play a decisive role in electing Joe Biden to the White House and Democrats up and down the ballot.
      “Whoever wins the Latino vote, is going to win Maricopa county. And whoever wins Maricopa county is going to win Arizona,” said Joseph Garcia, director of Chicanos Por La Causa Action Fund, a non-profit based in Phoenix. “And whoever wins Arizona is likely to win the White House.” More

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      in US Politics

      The Black electorate could decide the 2020 election. Here's why

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      Black Americans could decide the 2020 presidential election, particularly in key battleground states like Wisconsin and Florida. The battle for the White House approaches as Black Americans face the brunt of an unprecedented national crisis – one in 1,000 have died of the virus and African Americans are twice as likely to have lost a job.
      Joe Biden’s road to the White House could hang on Democrats’ ability to turn out their most loyal bloc.
      Although they have maintained a sizable advantage among African Americans over Republicans counterparts for decades, support for Democrats has slowly declined since the final years of Barack Obama’s presidency. That complicates Democratic efforts to court these 30 million eligible voters ahead of 3 November.

      African Americans are often depicted as a single, unified bloc, and many analysts warn Democrats that therein lies the problem. As experts debunk the myth of the Black voter monolith, the path to victory may be dependent on Democrats’ ability to speak to Black voters’ diversity.
      Here are factors that will shape Black voting turnout on election day, and their political power well beyond.
      Migration puts more states in play
      Since the 1970s, the US has experienced a reverse migration in which Black Americans move from northern cities back to the south. Most often, it’s to communities where they were born or where their families were rooted before the Great Migration – an era between 1916 and 1970 when 6 million African Americans escaped segregation and discrimination in the south, to pursue jobs up north.
      That makes states like Texas, South Carolina and Georgia more competitive.
      “There’s a clear understanding that a growing, energized bloc of African American voters can be a tipping point for any electorate,” Bill Frey, a senior fellow and demographer with the Brookings Institution, told the Guardian.
      “It’s an example of what we can see moving forward where many thought, and still think, that Georgia will eventually turn blue,” he added.
      Along with Georgia, the top states for Black population gains include Texas, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia – all swing or battleground states where the vice-president ramped up campaign efforts in the weeks leading up to 3 November. According to Pew, more than one-third of Black voters live in nine of the most competitive states.
      The Brookings Institution also noted that while progressive attitudes are most often held by younger, college-educated blacks, the influence of retirees and older Americans from more liberal cities can also skew voting blocs left.
      But that’s also creating a generational divide between more radical youth and their pragmatic elders. More

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      in US Politics

      'Abraham Lincoln over here': Trump and Biden clash on racism at presidential debate – video

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      Donald Trump has defended his handling of race issues in the US, declaring three times during the final presidential debate he is ‘the least racist person in this room’. Trump was questioned on his handling of incidents such as describing the Black Lives Matter movement as a symbol of hate and saying protesting Black athletes should be fired. Presidential rival Joe Biden called Trump ‘one of the most racist presidents we’ve had in modern history. He pours fuel on every racist fire’, before adding ‘this guy has a dog whistle about as big as a foghorn’
      Biden mauls Trump’s record on coronavirus in final presidential debate
      Civil rights and QAnon candidates: the fight for facts in Georgia – video More

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      in US Politics

      It's not enough for Black Lives Matter to protest. We must run for office too | Chi Ossé

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      Black Lives Matter, the second civil rights movement, was born seven years ago in the wake of the killings of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown. It has now come of age. After numerous waves of protest, the 2020 surge marked the largest protest movement in the history of the country. In June, I co-founded Warriors in the Garden, one of New York’s leading protest collectives, and spent nearly every day for months in the streets. This mass mobilization sprang to life following the killings of two more Black Americans, George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, at the hands of the police. But the catalyst was not the fuel. Slavery came to our shores in 1619, and has for 400 years defined both the Black experience and the United States. The nation is a powder keg; 2020 lit the fuse.The ensuing explosion has been bright and chaotic, like the final burst of fireworks on the Fourth of July. But powerful explosions, when coalesced, organized and pointed in the same direction, go by another name: a rocket. The protests are not the end but the engine. We are asked where we go from here. We answer that the sky is not the limit, but the direction.There exists a call in the movement to dismantle and deconstruct. Not just racism, but our strongest institutions as well. If for hundreds of years these institutions have served the powerful in quests of oppression, it is argued, then they must be replaced. I choose a more strategic approach, rooted in pride and optimism.The protests are working. Societal opinions of Black Lives Matter have flipped to majority-positive for the first time. As this is still a democracy, we must convert our popularity into political power.Black people built this country. For 400 years, our contributions to its foundations and fabric have been invaluable. Our free labor provided its original riches; our culture brightened its soul; our hard-earned successes gave it a fighting chance to look in the mirror and feel a sense of honest pride.Black people built this country. For 400 years, our contributions to its foundations and fabric have been invaluableWhile the language of the American promise is bold, optimistic, and worth fighting for, our history is more complicated. Our story is one of struggle and perseverance, by progressives against reactionaries, to make true Martin Luther King Jr’s belief that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” Changing technology and demographics, combined with society’s long-sought agreement to confront its past, offer this era a glimpse of an end to this fight. At once, the horizon becomes within reach.Over seven years, the Black Lives Matter movement has touched individuals and cities from coast to coast to reshape society. It has illuminated to millions of Americans the suffering of millions of others happening just under their noses. It sparked a re-evaluation of our history and heroes. It shone a spotlight on a swath of artists and leaders who had labored unrecognized for too long.Through this movement, many people – of good intentions but often under-informed – were made aware of their complacency and complicity in grave injustices, and committed to alleviating them. Black Lives Matter has awakened America.There is a belief in this country that a “silent majority” of Americans are conservatives, opposed to progress and loyal to a mythical past. While in Richard Nixon’s era this may have been true, it is no longer. There is no silent majority opposed to progressive change. The majority is with us and it is loud.The next step is to convert these voices to votes. It is from the platform of this philosophy that I launched my own bid to serve as a Gen Z member of the New York city council, and call on a young, multiracial coalition of progressives across the country to step forward as well. Monumental change will come with this coalition at the helm of America’s institutions, including its businesses, schools and the government itself. No longer must we rely primarily on making requests and demands of those in power, nor should we insist the seats of power be dismantled. We will claim those seats.We have invested far too much in this country, both willingly and unwillingly, to not finish the job. We built this ship. It is our right to sail it, and our duty to point it in the right direction.Then our democratic dream can be realized.The political ideology espoused in the streets this summer is not new. But our clear path to enact it might be. With popular support behind us, we stand at the threshold of political revolution. The key lies in merging the utility of democratic government with the tidal force of mass mobilization. If government is the machine, the movement must be its fuel.As Black Americans and our coalition fulfill our role as what Nikole Hannah-Jones calls in the 1619 Project “the perfecters of this democracy”, this second civil rights movement will be the last. The partnership between government and movement is the remedy to heal our historical scars and open wounds, and carry this democracy toward perfection. More