President Joe Biden on Friday called Black history “American history” as he courts African-American voters critical to his re-election bid.
“Black history is American history, we have a whole group out there trying to rewrite history, trying to erase history,” Biden said at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington DC.
He was there to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. The decision prohibited segregation in public schools.
“Seventy years ago, you changed the world,” Biden told attendees.
“The Brown decision demonstrates a simple idea: We learn better when we learn together,” he said.
In his remarks, Biden touted everything he has done for the Black community, including helping minority businesses, supporting Black education and helping to lower Black poverty rates.
He also noted that he has a black vice president: Kamala Harris.
‘Black history is American history,’ said President Joe Biden
Biden is increasing his appeal to black voters, a core group that helped elect him, as they show growing disenchantment with him and his presidency.
In addition to his speech on Friday, he and Harris will meet with leaders of the ‘Divine Nine,’ the historically black sororities and fraternities of which Harris is a member.
The president has also given eleven interviews this year alone to black radio hosts.
Biden will spend the weekend courting this vital group of core supporters, who helped him win the Democratic nomination and the White House in the 2020 election.
The main event will be his commencement address at Morehouse College on Sunday.
The prestigious, historically all-male university is the alma mater of several prominent black Americans, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., actor Samuel Jackson and Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock.
“I have more Morehouse men in my administration than Morehouse,” Biden joked Friday.
Biden’s courtship began on Thursday, when he received the plaintiffs in the historic Brown vs. case at the White House. the Board of Education.
On Saturday he will meet with black voters in Georgia.
Biden is scheduled to deliver the commencement address at Morehouse College in Atlanta on Sunday. Georgia is one of several key states that Biden won from Trump in 2020. She will receive an honorary degree from the school.
There is concern about the protests. Some Morehouse faculty and students oppose U.S. support for Israel in its war in Gaza.
Steve Benjamin, senior White House adviser and director of public engagement, told reporters Thursday that Biden believed in free speech, “and that right to free speech extends even to those who want to protest and he does.” respects, and makes it a point to bow when there are protesters in the same space.
On Sunday afternoon, the president will be in Detroit to deliver the keynote address at an NAACP event. He will also visit a locally owned black business.
Audience members at the National Museum of African American History and Culture listen to President Joe Biden’s speech.
NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson, left, greets President Joe Biden
His re-election campaign has reason to be worried.
Polls show that while Biden still leads Republican rival Donald Trump in support among black voters, his level of support has fallen sharply compared to four years ago.
“You have to answer two questions: Why go out and bother voting, which is almost the same question as what do I gain from this for the voters,” Biden campaign co-chairman Cedric Richmond told CNN. ‘And then he has to answer Janet Jackson’s quiz of: ‘What have you done for me lately?’
A survey of the New York Times/Siena College/Philadelphia Inquirer, published earlier this week, found that Biden leads Trump among black voters, 63 percent to 23 percent. But that’s more than 20 points lower than the 87 percent of Black voters who voted for Biden in 2020.
Furthermore, a Washington Post-Ipsos Poll A study last month found that fewer black Americans plan to vote in November.
The survey of more than 1,300 Black adults finds that 62 percent of them say they are “absolutely sure to vote,” down from 74 percent in June 2020. The 12 percentage point drop outpaces the four-point drop among Americans in general. from 72 percent to 68 percent.
Young black voters, in particular, are not enthusiastic about Biden. Overall, nearly 1 in 5 Black voters who voted for Biden in 2020 say they are unsure if they will vote this year.
The campaign is ramping up its efforts and bringing in big names to court Black voters on Biden’s behalf.
Congressman Jim Clyburn, a South Carolina Democrat who is one of the country’s most well-known and beloved black politicians, will travel to numerous swing states later this year on the president’s behalf.
Their stops include Michigan, Arizona, Nevada and Ohio.
Clyburn, a civil rights icon, essentially handed Biden the Democratic nomination four years ago when he helped Biden win the South Carolina presidential primary.
People watch the motorcade carrying President Joe Biden near the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Congressman Jim Clyburn, a Democrat from South Carolina, will campaign for President Biden in swing states, above Clyburn with Biden at Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston.
A lengthy memo from Biden’s re-election campaign on Friday outlines everything the president and vice president have done for the Black community.
“While the Black unemployment rate skyrocketed under Trump, the Biden-Harris administration helped create more than 2.5 million jobs for Black workers, resulting in record Black unemployment,” Trey writes Baker, senior campaign adviser.
Baker also points to the amount of forgiven student loans that went to the black community and that black child poverty was cut in half.
‘This campaign will not take any voter for granted. We will not pounce or parachute into these communities at the last minute, waiting for your vote. Every day, from now until Election Day, we will continue to work diligently to ensure that come November, Black voters send Joe Biden and Kamala Harris back to the White House,’ he noted.