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Bernie and the Black Vote
By Hettie V. Williams
Bernie Sanders has a problem with black voters. This has been abundantly noticeable in his various attempts to seek the office of president of the United States (U.S.). Bernie lost black voters in 2016 and he lost them again on super Tuesday in 2020. His lack of success with African American voters is a reoccurring theme in his political odyssey. Most recently, he chose not to attend the 55th anniversary of the Bloody Sunday March in Selma, Alabama gathering on the Edmund Pettus Bridge choosing instead to campaign in California. Bernie is, seemingly, no different from most politicians who have taken the black vote for granted with a limited willingness to employ race analysis to his discussion of economic inequality in America. He is also a millionaire with an estimated net worth of more than 2 million dollars, who travels in first class on airplanes, and owns three homes. Should millionaires exist — specifically those who define themselves as socialists that is? He is disingenuous to many black voters in part for his lack of a rigorous analysis of race as applied to class issues and perhaps his lifestyle.
To be clear, Bernie does have a history of involvement in civil rights activism; and, among black voters, it is the older generation of black voters who do not seem enamored with Bernie. Sanders worked with the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) to…