This is the second in a series of posts about the Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential contest and the black vote. As Joe Biden has observed, it is impossible for any Democratic presidential candidate to win that party’s nomination without significant support from black voters.
We examined Biden’s prospects in our last post. Here we consider the prospects of former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg.
Pete Buttigieg may be a once-in-a-generation political talent; but he has a huge political achilles heel: black voters don’t seem to like him much. As the New York Times’ Trip Gabriel and Richard A. Oppel Jr. report, Buttigieg’s problem with black voters
came to national attention on June 16, when a white sergeant fatally shot a 54-year-old black resident, Eric Logan. The officer’s body camera was not turned on, which was widely seen as a sign of lax standards in the department. Mr. Buttigieg found himself flying home again, regularly, to face the fury of some black citizens and the frustrations of many others.
In addition, there are legitimate concerns about Buttigieg’s record as mayor and the disproportionately adverse impact his policies may have had on African Americans. Again, the New York Times:
Reports of violent crime increased nearly 18 percent during the first seven months of 2019 compared to the same period in 2018. The number of people being shot has also risen markedly this year, after dropping last year. The city’s violent crime rate is double the average for American cities its size.
More recently, adds Michelle R. Smith in the Associated Press:
Buttigieg, who spent eight years as mayor of South Bend, Indiana, has tripped up in recent days as he was grilled about his record, including the racial disparity in marijuana arrests in South Bend and decisions that led to him having no African American leaders in his administration during a crucial stretch of his tenure in a city where more than a quarter of residents are black.
Finally, political analysts note that black Democrats are more religious and socially conservative than the Democratic Party as a whole. Thus they may be less inclined to support Buttigieg because he is a gay man who is fully committed to the LGBT political agenda and its corresponding infringement upon religious liberty.
This would explain why, last week, conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh explicitly observed that Buttigieg is gay: Limbaugh seems to sense that, within certain segments of the Democratic Party, Buttigieg’s homosexuality and commitment to the LGBT political agenda may be an electoral vulnerability.
Regardless, the bottom line is this: a Feb. 10, 2020, Quinnipiac University poll shows Buttigieg with just four percent of the black vote nationwide versus 27 percent for Biden; and unless and until that number increases dramatically to at least 20 percent or more, Buttigieg doesn’t have a chance at winning the nomination.
What Buttigieg can do, and to some extent has done already, is listen to his black critics, show empathy and understanding, and forthrightly address their concerns with specific and concrete policy proposals.
His record as mayor, after all, is not all that different from other mayors, black and white, who have had to confront vexing problems surrounding police and public safety, drug use, and economic inequality in predominantly black and minority communities.
What is different for Buttigieg is that he is new and unknown. Most black voters don’t know him. The big question is: does he have enough time to build bridges and inroads with the African American community?
Probably not. The South Carolina Primary (Feb. 29) and Super Tuesday (Mar. 3) are both roughly two weeks away. Mayor Pete may be better suited to win in 2024 than in 2020. We’ll see.
Next up, we’ll consider the prospects of former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Feature photo credit: Logan Cyrus/AFP/Getty Images via FiveThirtyEight.