As the 2024 presidential election season commences, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are initiating a strategic campaign to reinvigorate their support among Black American voters, as reported by Politico.
On January 8, Biden is scheduled to visit Charleston, South Carolina, where he will address the congregation at Mother Emanuel AME Church, one of the oldest black churches in the South. Harris will precede him with a visit to the state, speaking to the Seventh Episcopal District AME Church Womens Missionary Society. These coordinated visits are designed to demonstrate that the administration is not overlooking the importance of the black vote, according to campaign aides.
Principal deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks emphasized the administration's commitment to earning the support of black voters. Were not going to wait and parachute into these communities at the last minute and ask them for their vote. Were going to earn their vote, Fulks told Politico. He underscored the need to communicate effectively about the administration's accomplishments and the potential threats posed by the opposition. But voters of color are the ones who have the most at stake in this election. And we need to make sure that every single one of them understands the choice in front of them.
However, less than a year before the 2024 election, Biden's popularity among black voters appears to be dwindling. A recent GenForward survey revealed that Biden received 63 percent of the black vote, with 20% of the voting bloc stating they would not choose either Biden or former President Donald Trump in the 2024 election. This is a significant drop from the 2020 election, where Biden received 92 percent support from black voters, while Trump secured 8 percent, according to the Pew Research Center.
In response to this decline, White House aides reportedly convened a meeting with prominent black male Democrats in December to strategize on regaining the support of this crucial voting bloc, as reported by The New York Times. Attendees agreed that the president has primarily focused on black females since his 2020 presidential campaign.
The meeting attendees also highlighted another communication issue facing the White House, asserting that the administration has not sufficiently promoted its efforts to assist the black community. There are a lot of people who feel like they know hes done something, they just cant feel it yet. And theyre on the edge of their seat about when thats going to come, Antjuan Seawright, a South Carolina-based Democratic strategist, told Politico.
The early-year visits to South Carolina are also part of an effort to solidify the state's status as the first primary state beyond the 2024 election, a senior Biden official told Politico. We are following through on the presidents commitment to have South Carolina go first, the official stated. But the president was very serious when [he said] he wanted to make sure that the Democratic primary spoke to the full diversity of the Democratic Party and making sure that the base of the party, black voters, had a say in the early stage of the process.
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