Activists eye post-Charlottesville surge in black voting in Virginia
All eyes are on turnout for Tuesday's gubernatorial race.
By KEVIN ROBILLARD 11/05/2017 07:07 AM EST Updated 11/05/2017 08:16 AM EST
NORFOLK, Va. — Democratic activists expect a surge in black political engagement fueled by backlash to this summer’s violent white nationalist rally in Charlottesville could tip the scales in Tuesday's Virginia gubernatorial race.
Black voter turnout rates have been down around the country in the post-Obama era, from the 2016 presidential election through a string of special elections in 2017. It has been a long-standing source of concern for Democrats in Virginia, where up to one in five voters in recent elections has been black and where some have criticized Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam’s outreach to black voters.
But amid a toxic political environment, activists going door-to-door say they have seen African-American interest in voting spike since the summer, when low engagement alarmed Democratic pollsters hoping to elect Northam over Republican Ed Gillespie. Turnout already shot upward in heavily black areas during the Democratic primary, compared to the last one in 2009, and Northam won big in those regions in June. Since then, black political groups have run a steady stream of radio and digital ads invoking Charlottesville and inequality in the criminal justice system, including NFL players’ protests of the issue. And they are talking with voters one-on-one in Norfolk and other African-American population centers to make a personal case about voting this year.
“They feel that it’s not politics as usual,” said Adrianne Shropshire, the executive director of BlackPAC, which has been working with the Northam campaign to turn out African-American voters in Hampton Roads. “They know that something else is going on here.”
When BlackPAC first polled voters of color in the state in August, what they found concerned them. The percentage who said they were extremely likely to vote was in the high sixties, and Northam was trailing Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s 2013 performance among voters of color.
more
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/05/virginia-black-voters-charlottesville-244557
= new reply since forum marked as read
