With just 17 days left until the US presidential election, Kamala Harris is courting a particular demographic of black male voters with particular fervor.
Harris, especially as new polls warn that black voters who have consistently voted for Democratic presidential candidates (at least 80% since 1994) may be losing enthusiasm for the party. announced new policies targeting black men. . Plans she said include increasing access to the cannabis industry and educational opportunities that expand paths to “high-paying jobs, regardless of a college degree.”
But some pollsters say the panic among black male voters is overstated and that such statements ignore their historic support for the Democratic Party. They also point out that the focus on black men ignores deeper nuances about black Republican support and gender differences in black voting overall.
“To say we have to worry about black men not supporting Harris or the Democratic Party for any reason is completely overstated,” said the Black Voter Project, a polling effort on black voting behavior. said Chris Towler, founder of BVP. “I think a lot of the talk about the need to win back Black voters comes from a mainstream media narrative that’s built around really bad polling of Black voters.”
The latest national data shows that black men and women overwhelmingly prefer Harris as president, representing the highest level of Democratic support from all demographics. But some opinion polls suggest that support is waning. A recent New York Times/Siena College national poll found that 70% of likely black male voters support Harris (down from 85% of black men who voted for Biden in 2020). By comparison, 83% of likely black women voters reported supporting Harris. The poll found that 20% of black male voters said they would vote for Trump if the election were held today, an increase of 6 percentage points from the share who voted for the former president in 2016.
Some headlines conclude that such polls are evidence that President Trump is making “gains” among black voters. But Towler argued that national polls that survey majority white voters “are not intended to measure black public opinion.” Instead, such surveys ask questions of the general population, extract data from specific demographics, and attempt to draw specific conclusions about Black voting behavior from small groups. Towler said BVP surveyed more than 2,000 black voters in April and 1,600 in August, while only 589 black voters were surveyed in the September Times/Siena College poll. He pointed out that it was. The BVP poll includes non-voters and takes into account “cultural competency in questioning and collecting data from Black voters.”
Widely reported national data may also overlook the distinction between men and women within the black voting population. Kiana Cox, a senior researcher on the Pew Research Center’s Race and Ethnicity team, said that data shows that some voters, for example, think Harris is a priority for black men, but they don’t care about economic issues. They argued that they may lack confidence in how to deal with this and may end up neglecting it. It matters more to Black women, according to an October Pew Research poll.
Another report from September, written by Mr. Cox, found that 45% of black men under the age of 50 were “very (or) somewhat confident” that Mr. Trump could make good decisions on economic policy. It is said that Only 20% of black women in the same age group felt the same way. Cox said the gender disparity among black voters who support President Trump could be explained by distinctions on economic issues. However, national opinion polls rarely reveal these subtle points.
The latest data on black male voters is part of a larger “anxiety, dissonance, and distance” that many feel toward the Democratic Party, especially among younger voters who grew up during the Obama administration, the assistant professor said. Leah Wright Rigere said. in history from Johns Hopkins University and an expert on black male voting patterns.
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Since the 1960s, the Republican Party has been successful in appealing to black men rather than highly partisan black women, Rigere said. In fact, the latest numbers on Trump support among black men mirror similar data on Republican support during the Reagan administration, but have gained increased attention given the competitive nature of the 2024 election.
Still, she noted that the parties’ concerns about Black male voters are “valuable” as Democrats are forced to respond with meaningful policies. She noted that some of Harris’ policies address specific concerns of black men about being “left behind” in the economy.
Towler should focus primarily on black turnout, as black voters’ interest in supporting the Democratic Party grows and news of black voters moving to the Republican Party could reduce votes. he pointed out. “Coverage that makes it seem like there’s no difference between the two parties and that they’re both equally bad, as if black voters are leaning toward the Republican Party, tends to reduce turnout,” he said. “That makes us less likely to move closer to the Republican Party.” It will garner the high turnout of black voters needed to influence battleground states in the right direction. ”
