From Project 2025 to ‘high as hell’ rent: Black voters back away from Biden and Trump

Eric Garcia speaks with Black voters at the Republican National Convention and on the ground in Wisconsin, a must-win state

U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) speaks on stage on the first day of the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum on July 15, 2024 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Donalds has emerged as one of the most visible Black voices in the Republican Party (Getty Images (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images))

On Tuesday, the second day of the Republican National Convention, a slew of Black Republicans convened at the Iron Horse for a gathering they called the “New Mavericks.”

Black Republicans have always occupied a peculiar space in their party going back to when the GOP was founded as an anti-slavery party. Many Black Americans feel that Republicans’ “tough on crime” politics focus on unjustly profiling and prosecuting people of color. Similarly, few have forgotten Donald Trump saying, “When the looting starts, the shooting starts,” among other unsavory statements about Black protesters and majority-Black cities.

But during the gathering at the Iron Horse, Black Republicans talked amongst themselves about how many Black Republicans have been elected. The night before, numerous Black Republicans — ranging from North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson to Representative Byron Donalds of Florida to Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina — spoke to the crowd, a sign that the GOP is taking its Black voter outreach seriously.

“This is the move that we’re making to all voters in our country,” Donalds told The Independent. Ever since he launched a longshot bid to become speaker last year, Donalds has become somewhat of a conservative celebrity, willing to joust with Black Democrats and go on MSNBC to directly challenge liberal pundits.

“When we say we're trying to get everybody, we're trying to get everybody,” he added.

The second night of the convention, Vivek Ramaswamy, the businessman-turned-presidential candidate, tried making a direct appeal to Black voters. He said Republicans just wanted Black voters to have “safe neighborhoods, clean streets, good jobs, a better life for your children and a justice system that treats everyone equally, regardless of your skin color and regardless of your political beliefs.”

It helps Republicans that President Joe Biden is currently having to fight to keep Black voters in the Democratic fold. Democrats have typically relied on high Black voter turnout in cities like Milwaukee to flip Wisconsin, Philadelphia to win in Pennsylvania, Detroit to win in Michigan and Atlanta to win in Georgia. But Wednesday’s polls showed Biden’s support in freefall among Black Democratic voters, with a full 50 percent of respondents saying he should step aside and allow someone else to go to the top of the ticket.

Outside the literal gated community that is the Republican National Convention campus, Black voters in Milwaukee are not entirely sold on either candidate.

Camiel Hampton told The Independent: “One of them is cognitively declining and the other is—,” before her sister Amanda cut in, about Trump: “—He steal money and don’t give me none.”

“There should be like an age minimum and an age limit,” Camiel said.

“We should ask [Biden] what he had for breakfast last Friday and he should be able to tell us,” Amanda added.

Jamyle Edwards told The Independent that he is looking at voting third-party.

“I think that people should do their research on other parties because the two candidates that we have...I wouldn’t say they’re the best two candidates that we could have for those major two parties,” he told The Independent.

“With Trump, it’s really about the whole racism — Project 2025 is really bulls***t, if I can say that,” Edwards added. “I just feel like Biden is like... I don’t really feel he’s doing as much as he could or as much as he promised that he would. Prices are going up everywhere. Rent is high as hell.”

Biden’s age has become a major problem ever since his faltering debate performance in Atlanta, which has led some Democrats to call for him to be replaced. Democrats have a lot of work to do, especially in places like Milwaukee, where slightly less than 40 percent of the population is Black. Black voter turnout dropped to 48 percent in 2018 to 42.3 per cent in the 2022 midterms, according to the US Census. The numbers are even more pronounced among young voters. In 2018, 29.6 percent of Black voters between the ages of 18 to 24 voted, and only 21.8 percent of Black voters in that same age group turned out in 2022.

On Tuesday, Biden made remarks to the NAACP, where he specifically brought up Trump’s claim at the debate about immigrants taking “Black jobs.”

Ben B., who asked not to use his full name, told The Independent that the only other time he voted in an election was for Barack Obama in 2008. Back then, he was excited to vote for a Black man to be president — but this time around, he’s planning to cast a ballot for Trump.

What appeals to him about Trump’s platform is “closing the borders, getting this immigration under control, because I mean, I don't have problem with people migrating here but you’ve got to do it with a certain means,” Ben said.

He also cited his difficulty finding a job as a reason he wasn’t voting for Biden and added: “Inflation is killing me too.”

During the gathering at the Iron Horse, Republican elected officials talked about the difficulty of being rare in their communities. One of the speakers — Bruce LeVell, a Trump campaign adviser — noted how Scott, the first Black elected Senator from the South since Reconstruction, was passed over to be Trump’s vice president for the hardline Ohio Senator JD Vance. Nevertheless, they added, there would be other opportunities. They were sure of it.