How Kamala Harris and Democrats can solve their Black men “problem”
WAYNE, MICHIGAN – AUGUST 08: Democratic presidential candidate U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris greets audience members at a campaign rally at United Auto Workers Local 900 on August 8, 2024 in Wayne, Michigan. Kamala Harris and her newly selected running mate Tim Walz are campaigning across the country this week. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
Experts who spoke with theGrio point to a few opportunities the Harris campaign has to sway young Black male voters in the final two weeks before Election Day.
The worry this election cycle about Black men, the Democratic Party’s second-most loyal voting bloc, has no end in sight as polling consistently shows a lag in their support for the presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris.
However, experts who spoke with theGrio point to a few opportunities Harris and Democrats have to sway Black male voters in the final two weeks before Election Day on Nov. 5.
Dr. Alvin Tillery, a pollster and CEO of the super PAC Alliance for Black Equality, tells theGrio that he has qualitative data that shows that while Harris and Democrats do struggle with young Black men, those voters are persuadable.
Recent polling commissioned by Dr. Tillery shows that Kamala Harris can improve her approval with young Black male voters 8-15% by tailoring her campaign messaging on how Donald Trump poses direct threats to Black men, namely as it relates to policing and the rolling back of civil rights and diversity and equity programs.
“Democrats have played this wrong, and they put themselves in a position to lose,” said Tillery, who said he warned the then-Biden campaign last fall about polling data showing young Black men drifting away from Democrats.
“I don’t think anybody believed it,” he told theGrio. “But there’s still time,” added Dr. Tillery, who said it’s important to focus the last two weeks before the election on countering misinformation, which experts tell theGrio is largely driving young Black men’s support for Trump. According to an NAACP survey, a quarter of them back the former president.
Tillery, whose polling is conducted by his data firm 2040 Strategy Group, points to key policy issues that he found move young Black men away from Trump and back to Harris and the Democratic Party.
According to the latest polling from Alliance for Black Equality, when presented with Donald Trump’s record of supporting national stop-and-frisk policing and Project 2025’s proposals to eliminate DEI programs — a key tool for combating racial discrimination — young Black men’s concerns about harm to Black men increased by 23% and 16%, respectively.
“When you tell young Black men the straight facts about Kamala Harris and who she is, they like her overwhelmingly,” Tillery shared with theGrio, adding, “Just as much as when you tell Black men that Donald Trump is going to stop and frisk you.”
BRENTWOOD, NY – JULY 28: President Donald Trump speaks at Suffolk Community College on July 28, 2017 in Brentwood, New York. Trump, speaking close to where the violent street gang MS-13 has committed a number of murders, urged Congress to dedicate more funding to border enforcement and faster deportations. Trump spoke to an audience that included law enforcement officers and the family members of crime victims. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
The pollster noted that Black men also responded positively when told about Harris’ record and her identity as a Black woman. Alliance for Black Equality is also running six-figure ads targeting young Black men with the aforementioned persuasion talking points about Harris and Trump.
“They get one of our ads saying not only is the VP great and Black, but look at what this old guy wants to do,” said Tillery. “He wants to stop and frisk you. He wants to make it easier for your white boss to discriminate against you. Those two things are the cocktail for winning this election over the next 14 days.”
Angela Angel, a senior advisor at Black Lives Matter PAC, told theGrio that she believes targeted messages to correct Harris and Trump’s records are critical for young Black men.
Angel, a former Maryland state delegate, said she has been canvassing and talking to Black men in cities like Philadelphia and found that what is on their social media algorithms is “crazy.”
“Many of us that are in the political sphere … we have no idea how deep it is,” said Angel.
“They’re also hearing it from what feels like everyday people. And so, for them, that’s more trusted because they don’t trust politicians.”
The political operative believes that the surrogates the Harris campaign has deployed to talk to Black voters are not the right “trusted messengers.”
The campaign has several Black men campaigning on behalf of Harris. Some are high-profile Democrats like former President Barack Obama, who will be rallying with Harris on Thursday in Atlanta, Georgia.
Angel says the campaign would do better with younger Black male voices, like online influencers and hip-hop stars, or those who come from certain lived experiences like the Central Park Five, who were wrongfully convicted and later exonerated in 1989 and recently filed a defamation lawsuit against Trump.
Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Barack Obama attend an April 2022 event to mark the 2010 passage of the Affordable Care Act in the East Room of the White House. With then-Vice President Joe Biden by his side, Obama signed “Obamacare” into law on March 23, 2010. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
Dr. Tillery agrees that President Obama, whom he described as “preachy,” may not be the best messenger for disaffected younger Black men.
He explained, “That’s another weakness of the Democratic campaign … they’re deploying these Gen X and Boomer messengers.”
“We think that meeting them where they are on media that they like and use already, using a little bit of humor, a lot of knowledge deployment, is the way to move,” he shared.
Tillery said a better way to utilize President Obama would be to “go on a tour with young millennial and Gen Z Black influencers.” He continued, “Then introduce the subject and get out of the way.”
Critiques aside, Dr. Tillery noted that Harris has made significant improvements in her approval numbers with younger Black men surveyed by Alliance for Black Equality.
After sitting down for interviews with Charlamagne Tha God, Roland Martin and The Shade Room — and releasing her “Opportunity Agenda for Black Men” — Tillery said Harris’ outreach is “starting to work with young Black men.”
The Democratic presidential nominee’s approval jumped from 49% to 59%, he noted. However, he added, “The problem is she’s still 20 points behind where she needs to be.”
“They need to keep doing what they’re doing,” said Tillery. “And you continue to need projects like ours — independent messengers — that are, frankly, just going to keep it real.”