Black voters have long been the loyal backbone of the Democratic Party, but polls this year have shown some younger Black men may not feel the same degree of party loyalty that their mothers, sisters or aunts do.
About one in five younger Black men say they support the Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, according to new polling of voters done for the NAACP between Oct. 11-17. The poll of 1,000 registered Black voters had a margin of error of 3.14 percentage poins.
Support for Trump has dropped since August, according to data from the group announced on Monday. But it’s still a warning sign for the Harris campaign, which needs strong turnout from Black men in tight races in swing states and has been working to address this vulnerability.
Harris downplays the concern even as she courts Black male voters
The issue was elevated by former President Barack Obama, who delivered a blunt message to young Black men on Oct. 10 about backing Harris.
Harris has said that she knows she has to “earn” the votes of Black men, just as with any other demographic. But in an interview with The Breakfast Club, a popular Black radio show, Harris dismissed the idea that she has a particular weakness with Black male voters.
“The brothers aren’t saying that,” she said in the interview, which aired Tuesday. She described the issue as a “media narrative.”
“The Black men, in particular, who are at the rallies have recently been saying, 'Don’t you listen to that. And they got to stop with all that noise. We support you,'” Harris said.
Joshua Doss with HIT strategies, the biggest Black-owned political consulting firm in the country, said he thinks the concerns have been overplayed.
“The truth is, Black men are the least Trumpy male voters in America — full stop,” Doss told reporters. HIT strategies conducted the surveys for the NAACP.
The latest survey of registered voters found Black men under 50 have decreased their likelihood to vote for Trump to 21%, down from 27% in August — and increased their likelihood to vote for Harris to 59%, up from 51% in August.
What Harris has been doing on the trail to reach Black voters
Since Obama’s warning, the Harris campaign has been working to get their message out to young Black men, including a town hall with Charlamagne tha God and the Club Shay Shay podcast.
Harris spent much of the day Sunday in Philadelphia courting Black voters — attending church and then later visiting a barbershop to meet Black men, before dropping by a historic Black-owned bookstore in the city.
“The path to victory runs right through all the leaders who are here,” she told a largely Black crowd at a rally in Philadelphia.
Derrick Johnson, the president of the NAACP, said “mis- and disinformation that is circulating on social media” was the biggest challenge in getting young Black voters to the polls.
Johnson noted the median age in the Black community is 32, so many people are getting their news online rather than from traditional news platforms. “Our goal is to try to penetrate that as much as possible,” he told reporters.
The NAACP poll showed that messaging on health care seems to be translating more effectively to Black men in recent weeks, increasing their likelihood to vote.
On Saturday, former first lady Michelle Obama made a direct plea to men — and framed this election as a fight to protect the reproductive rights and healthcare for the women in their lives.
“I’m asking y’all from the core of my being to take our lives seriously — please,” Obama said. “Do not put our lives in the hands of politicians — mostly men — who have no clue or do not care about what we, as women, are going through.”
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