March 10, 2025 • 25 mins
In part 1 of a 3 part series, Host Ramses Ja is joined by Dr. Christopher Towler from the Black Voter Project to discuss the latest data and research from the Black Voter Project on Donald Trump and Black voter activity and opinions.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Born out of a desire to emphasize the instrumental role
Black voters play in our understanding of American politics. The
Black Voter Project public opinion surveys explore African American political attitudes, behavior,
and voting in ways that are often unexamined. With a
focus on contemporary issues in politics, Expertise in political history
(00:21):
and survey design allows for unique insights into African American
mobilization and social movement organization. Extreme political polarization makes black
political turnout a necessity for progressive politics today. Christopher Tller,
PhD is an associate professor in the Department of Political
Science at California State University, Sacramento.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
He is the.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Director of the Black Voter Project, co founder of Black
Insights Research, and the editor in chief of the Journal
of Race, Ethnicity and Politics. And he is our guest today.
This is the Black Information Network Daily Podcast, and I'm
your host, Rams' job. All right, mister Christopher Twler, Welcome
(01:04):
back to the show. A lot has changed since we
last spoke. What's the latest in your world?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
A whole lot has changed. Thank you so much for
having me back. Not only has the political world changed,
but you know, my own research and projects have advanced,
and I've got a whole bunch of new data that
I'm hoping to share with you this morning.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
All Right, we appreciate it. So again, I gave a
bit of a brief introduction. Do us a favor for
folks that have kind of just coming because we've had
a lot of folks tuned into the bi in since
the election has taken place, because people are definitely concerned
and a little bit more in tune with the news cycle.
(01:46):
Just a brief background on yourself, you know, outside of
the things that we discussed, you know where you grew up,
you know what kind of motivated you to kind of
walk this path you're on. And we'll get to the
good stuff.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
Yeah, So originally from Colorado, grew up Denver Boulder area
along the turnpike there and ended up staying home, receiving
my undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado, and then
I went off to grad school at the University of
Washington in Seattle in two thousand and seven, which means
that I was in my first year of grad school
(02:21):
in two thousand and eight when Obama ran and successfully
won President of the United States, and so I was
pretty much acculturated as a grad student, just really starting
to study politics in a very sort of advanced way
when we have the first black president, and that pushed
me wholeheartedly into wanting to understand and look at African
(02:43):
American public opinion, black attitudes, and political behavior. But all
throughout grad school I kept running into an issue. Studying
this in a very empirical and advanced way was difficult,
as there was not much data being collected or otherwise
on Black Americans, specifically in political science, but also across
(03:06):
all other disciplines, and so I worked on trying to
collect some data in grad school small parts of other projects.
But the first thing I did when I received my
first job in two thousand and fourteen coming out of
grad school was collect my own data, and I collected
a pilot study of battleground in swing states a little
(03:29):
over five hundred people. But that has now turned into
a continuous and ongoing project, the Black Voter Project, in
which I worked to collect as much data as possible,
and this last election cycle, I had the opportunity to
do a really really cool longitudinal survey where I collected
four waves of data attempting to survey the same people
(03:50):
at four different points throughout the election, one of those
points being just this past December after the election took place.
So I'm excited to share some of those results with you,
discuss how these findings kind of can help us understand
black public opinion and attitudes after the election, and maybe
what to expect looking forward.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Okay, okay, very good. So, you know, for folks that
don't know, you and I had a conversation just before
the election, Kamala Harris versus Donald Trump, and we broke
down a lot of the conversations that were taking place
surrounding that election. I remember, you know, black men's support
(04:36):
for Donald Trump being one of the things that we discussed,
or black men's support of the Republican Party, because that
was a hot button issue that was being debated at
the time. And I remember learning something profound from you
at that time. So before we get into those weeds,
let's start where I feel like you might want to
start share with us a bit of you know, maybe
(05:00):
two or three of the more surprising things that you've
learned or things that you think we would be interested
to know since the election. You know, what are some
things that have kind of made themselves apparent in the data.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
So I think, you know, there's pretty much three main
findings from the data that I'd like to point out,
the first being, following up on our pre election conversation,
you know, the post election results, the data collected in
December shows that black support for Harris did not fall off,
and Harris received almost exactly the same amount of support
(05:35):
that Biden did in twenty twenty from the black community,
and that that support amongst black men continued to grow
throughout the election cycle, and after the election we actually
see black men reporting to have supported Harris at rates
a bit higher than they did Biden in twenty twenty.
So those narratives around black support, you know, sort of
(05:56):
waning from Harris or even moving to Trump didn't baring
come true. Secondly, turnout did matter, though, and other analyzes
of census data looking at county level turnout suggests that
counties that had higher black populations had much lower turnout
than more white counties, and these differences were greater in
(06:18):
twenty twenty four than in twenty twenty. So it was
not about whether or not black people voted for Harris,
but again whether or not they actually voted at all. Yeah,
and so that's the first finding. The second finding has
to do with this understanding of what to expect going forward,
(06:39):
and really that there's a sense amongst the black community,
at least in the data that I collected, that politics
is sort of over for the time being. There's a
need to take a step back. There's less enthusiasm for
the Democratic Party, and a good era of Black people
(07:01):
pretty much just want to stay out of politics for
a little while and be left alone after the election.
And that's something that coupled with sort of the already
lower turnout rates, is going to be really difficult. But
the Democrats have to find a way to overcome that
going into twenty twenty six and twenty twenty eight, as
they depend on Black voters right as the backbone of
the party and the voters that continuously and consistently turn
(07:24):
out for Democratic candidates. And then lastly, though, when modeling
all of this and trying to understand what got black
people to turn out, it's very clear that those that
turned out were the ones who were most worried about
or anxious about this Trump presidency and kind of the
most informed about what could happen in terms of Project
(07:47):
twenty twenty five, the attacks on DEI, everything that we've
come to fruition. Right, if you knew about these things,
you were ware about these things, you were worried about
these things before the election, that was kind of one
of the most significant fasts driving people to vote. And
so looking forward, right, I've looked back. I've relied upon
some sort of experimental survey results where we tested different
(08:08):
statements and messages with voters and show them that, yes,
you can change people's minds about Trump. And the more
you change people's minds and get them to think, hey,
he is a danger, the more likely they're going to
come out to vote, regardless of all other things. Right,
no matter what you're talking to, men, women, young, old voters,
this works. That the Democrats, you know, in my opinion,
really need to make sure that they get this message
(08:30):
out and that people aren't just sitting back being like
I don't want to deal with politics anymore, that they
understand how important it is at this moment to fight
back and continue to resist and push forward. Otherwise it's
just going to continue to get worse.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Well, I'm going to I'm going to share some thoughts
with you, and I guess I just want you to
kind of reflect on them. I don't know that out
there will be a question here, but you know, you
mentioned that this election was shaped by more by people
(09:05):
black people and people in general, i'd imagine not voting
than by the folks who actually voted. Now, obviously the
folks that voted did shape the outcome, but there was
Donald Trump, for instance, won the popular vote as well
as the Electoral College with less votes than he ever
had in either of the prior to elections, and so
(09:29):
overall voter enthusiasm had waned. But when talking about black
people specifically, and you know how black people feel exhausted
on the other side of this election and are unenthusiastic
about the Democratic Party, I'm curious as to where that
(09:53):
comes from. Now. On the one hand, if I were
to imagine and this is I think think this is
where I want you to kind of step in and
just kind of interpret what data you have and the
conversations you've had, but I'll share my thoughts here. On
the one hand, I feel like maybe black folks are
(10:19):
just heartbroken in general about politics, right because we had
a Trump presidency and every day people had to wake
up like, oh, my god, what did you do today?
For four years and then there was the looming kind
of dark shadow being cast from Project twenty twenty five.
(10:42):
And then Donald Trump won, And I think in everyone's mind,
the bad guy doesn't win, but in a lot of
black folks mind, clearly, based on the data, Donald Trump
was the bad guy, right, and he won with all
the levers of government, with a full Supreme Court backing him,
you know, on and on. Oh, he was off the
leash to do whatever he wanted, and we were just
(11:03):
sort of at the mercy of that. So being exhausted
with politics in general, i'd imagine that might have been
part of that might have worked its way into Black
folks feeling unenthusiastic about the Democrats specifically, but you know,
politics in general. The other side of it, I would
imagine is that black people were particularly hurt because those
(11:29):
that showed up to vote for Kamala Harris. I'm not
talking about the low information people who you know, didn't
end up voting or voted the other way or whatever,
but those that voted for Kamala Harris ultimately knew that
despite her stance on Palestine or the administration at the
Times that stands on Palestine or whatever issues, that she
(11:50):
was the most qualified person for the job. She had
worked in all three branches of government. She just knew
what she was doing. She had served as the vice president,
was the most qualify if I had to represent the
interest in the United States, to represent the interest of
black people. She had an agenda for black men, the
whole bit right. And for a black woman to lose
to him, I think it showed just how deep racism
(12:17):
in the minds of black people. And I believe that
that's true the to a degree, just how deep racism
runs in this country for him to get be elected
over her. But what it doesn't show me, or what
I have not heard specifically, is the logic behind black
(12:39):
people I suppose turning against Democrats like it's very it's
all well and good to say, well, the Democrats have
never done anything for black people, when there is an
alternative that has done things for black people, But when
the Democrats. If the narrative is that Democrats have not
done anything for black people, and the alternative is Republicans
who have actively worked worked against black people, stripping away
(13:03):
measures that are intended to stabilize or reinforce, you know,
black folks that have been implemented in society over time.
I find that part troubling. And to see the Democrats
scrambling left and right at everyone's whim my own included,
because I've been critical of Democrats since the election, I'll
(13:24):
admit it, but they ran as solid a campaign as
they could, you know, in my opinion. And I don't
know what to make of the larger audience in terms
of that and the rest of these too. And you're
a person that you know clearly this is something that
we're all still struggling with. But you know, when you
(13:45):
have data, at least you can make heads or tails
of it, so you know your thoughts. There's no real
question there, but your thoughts on just kind of all
this whatever jumps out?
Speaker 3 (13:52):
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Speaker 1 (14:55):
We are here today with Christopher Towler, Associate Professor in
the Department of politicals Cients at California State University, Sacramento,
director of the Black Voter Project, and the editor in
chief of the Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Yeah, I think I'll start where you started with sort
of this question as to why in general, black people
are more apathetic, we're not engaged, and really, I mean
data suggest time and time again black people feel more alienated,
more disillusioned, have less trust in politics, have less trust
in politicians, and rightfully so, right, it's only been the
(15:34):
last fifty sixty years that we've seen full and equal
in corporation into politics through voting, through representation, and really
since the nineteen sixties, in the voting following the Voting
Rights Act, black Americans have really pushed not only for representation,
but for empowerment and to actually see representatives who can
get policy done and who can bring resources and things
(15:56):
back to the Black community. We've seen some representation. I
think the jury's still out on how much empowerment Black
people have through voting in traditional politics. But really, in
two thousand and eight and with the Obama years, that
idea of representation right came to a head because there
was now a black president, the ultimate sense of political
(16:17):
representation in the United States of America. However, coming out
of the Obama years, right, it was very clear that
there was a need for more empowerment and that there
was a good segment of Black America that felt like
Obama didn't do enough for Black people and that this
idea of representation kind of is empty without continued outcomes
or empowerment or policy that actually affects the black community. Right,
(16:41):
you can argue, how you know, for days as to
whether or not Obama's or how much Obama's policies actually
affect the black community, but that sentiment was out there,
and so right us studying this in political science, studying
black politics, we could tell very quickly that coming out
of Obama years in twenty sixteen, black turnout black enthusiasm
was not going to be the same. Right, it was
(17:03):
already waning during Obama's second term. There was a lot
of critique coming from some of the left black political
thinkers of Obama, and as we saw in twenty sixteen, turnout,
black turnout dropped significantly from twenty eight, two thousand and
eight and twenty twelve. Twenty twenty though, we kind of
saw a perfect storm right as you mentioned, four years
(17:23):
of Trump. People got to see the types of policies
and presidency that he was going to have or that
he had. But we also had George Floyd that summer,
and a lot of people really forget how much COVID
actually affected things as well and forced a lot of
states to expand there the ways that they allowed people
to vote, right, A lot of states allowed for mail
(17:44):
and voting sort of mail ballots and people to vote
in ways that they traditionally would is. So it made
it a lot easier to vote in twenty twenty as
well during COVID. And so this sort of perfect storm
of this Trump presidency, George Floyd and COVID boosted Black
turnout right not quite back up to twenty eight or
twenty twelve levels, but significantly higher than twenty sixteen, in
(18:08):
such a way that Biden was able to win. However,
right this past election, we didn't have that perfect storm.
We didn't have four years of Trump ingrained in our memory.
We didn't have a significant protest movement the summer before
the election, and a lot of states worked really hard
during the Biden era to make voting much more difficult. Right.
We saw that in states across the country, specifically states
(18:32):
like Texas, states like Georgia in particular, right a battleground
state put in a lot of restrictions limiting how people
can vote and when people can vote, and so those
elements then showed up this election cycle, and you're absolutely right.
I think it was a wake up call, especially for
those who really support Harris in the movement behind her, right,
(18:55):
those that came on the call after her announcement and
raised tons of money. It was a a punch to
the gut for those people in that group. And you know,
what ended up being an election that could have solidified
some sense of not only representation, but potentially empowerment in
the Democratic Party for Black Americans ended up sort of
(19:16):
lifting Black people up, especially those that supported her. But
then it all came crashing down pretty quickly. And you know,
as I look at the data, right, we asked people
how much they felt the Democratic Party was welcoming to
black people, and that continued to increase over the election cycle.
It started at about twenty eight percent saying the party
(19:38):
was extremely welcoming to black people in April when Biden
was the candidate, jumped all the way up to forty
two percent in October, right before the election, when Harris
was you know, full steam ahead. However, in December following
the election, it dropped about another ten points, back down
to four to thirty five percentage points. Right, and so
we see a reversal here in attitudes towards the Democratic
(20:00):
Party and black people. We also saw that when we
asked people whether or not a second Trump presidency would
motivate them to become more committed to politics, or if
a second Trump presidency would prove exhausting and they just
want to be left alone, right, Only twenty three percent
of people said it would motivate them, compared to forty
three percent who said it would be exhausting and they
(20:20):
just want to be left alone. And I think this
speaks to your point here. Of those that said it
would be exhausting and left alone, fifty one percent of
Black women felt this way. Yeah, a whole majority of
black women after the election of December said, you know,
a second Trump presidents is just going to be exhausting.
I'd rather be left alone rather than feeling motivated going
(20:42):
into you know, this presidency to work more. And so
all of those things mounting up really put us in
a position right now where the apathy, the exhaustion, even
the disillusionment with the Democratic Party our front and center.
And you know, I feel like there's a couple of
ways to attack that and get around it. But it's there,
it's undeniable. It's something that we have to deal with.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
Well while we're here, what I mean, what are your thoughts?
A couple of ways to attack that and get around
is sure.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
So, as I mentioned, when modeling all of this out
and actually looking at how some of these things influenced
turnout versus others, and so actually doing a more rigorous
analysis in comparing the influence of different factors to one another,
one of the most influential factors in determining whether or
(21:32):
not someone was going to vote was this idea of
political threat, whether or not Trump was a threat, whether
or not mag was a threat, even things like abortion right,
whether or not people saw abortion bands as a threat.
If they felt like there was a threat specifically to
the black community, they were more likely to turn out.
And again this was across the board. It didn't matter
(21:54):
if you're looking at men, women, young, old educated, college educated,
not college education. This idea of threat matters. And so
throughout these surveys we ran a number of experiments where
we asked people sort of different questions or gave people
different ways to think about politics, and then looked at
(22:15):
how that influenced their attitudes, and so, for example, at
one point we asked people whether or not they think
that black people must support the Democratic Party, and so
it was like a yes, you must support it. I
agree you must support this Democratic Party, or I disagree
we should, we don't have to support the Democratic Party.
We then took all of those people who said they
(22:37):
disagreed with this statement and gave them a couple of
statements to read. We gave them one statement that really
described Trump as a threat to the black community, pointing
out him and Maga's attempts to ban black history, to
eliminate DEI, to use you know, military to break up protests,
and really highlighted the way that Trump was a threat.
(23:00):
We then gave another statement to different participants that looked
at Harris as sort of a empowerment candidate, someone that
was going to be a black face for the Democratic
Party and potentially do things for the black community once
she got into politics. So we're trying to see if
either of these messages makes people feel more inclined to
(23:23):
support the Democratic Party of those that received the Harris
prime or the statement about Harris as being sort of
this black candidate for the Democratic Party eighty percent of
those who said they disagreed that blacks must support the
Democratic Party maintain that position, right. And so there was
about twenty percent of people who moved after getting this
(23:44):
statement about Harris and said, Okay, I disagreed that we
must support the Democratic Party, but after hearing about Harris
as the face of the party, now I agree. Right.
Of those that received the Trumps statement, though, forty percent
moved double twice as many people, yeah, move to saying Okay,
now I feel like I got to support the Democratic
Party after seeing what type of threat Trump represents.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Okay, so these are right, Okay, I see they're responding
to the threat.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
I can this couple? Right, This, coupled with the modeling
showing that these ideas of threat really move people, right, suggests,
at least from the research that we've been doing, that
the Democrats have to find a way to make as
many black people understand the threat that Trump represents if
his presidency doesn't do it alone. And again, right in
twenty twenty, we had this perfect storm where four years
(24:33):
of Trump, this protest movement COVID made it so that
the Democrats, probably regardless of their type of messaging, we're
going to win that election. It's you know, there's no
guarantee that that type of thing is going to happen again,
whether we look at the midterm elections or the presidency
of twenty twenty eight. And so Democrats in their messaging,
in their communication with their constituents, particularly Black constituents, have
(24:54):
to make this clear. They have to reach these low
information voters, these low propensity voters, and they talk to them.
They have to prioritize a message that shows how much
of a threat to the black community Trump, MAGA and
these policies are.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
This concludes part one of our conversation with Christopher Taller, PhD,
the director of the Black Voter Project, co founder of
Black Insights Research, and the editor in chief of the
Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics. Check back in with
us tomorrow for Part two, right here on the Black
Information Network Daily Podcast
Born out of a desire to emphasize the instrumental role
Black voters play in our understanding of American politics. The
Black Voter Project public opinion surveys explore African American political attitudes, behavior,
and voting in ways that are often unexamined. With a
focus on contemporary issues in politics, Expertise in political history
(00:21):
and survey design allows for unique insights into African American
mobilization and social movement organization. Extreme political polarization makes black
political turnout a necessity for progressive politics today. Christopher Tller,
PhD is an associate professor in the Department of Political
Science at California State University, Sacramento.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
He is the.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Director of the Black Voter Project, co founder of Black
Insights Research, and the editor in chief of the Journal
of Race, Ethnicity and Politics. And he is our guest today.
This is the Black Information Network Daily Podcast, and I'm
your host, Rams' job. All right, mister Christopher Twler, Welcome
(01:04):
back to the show. A lot has changed since we
last spoke. What's the latest in your world?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
A whole lot has changed. Thank you so much for
having me back. Not only has the political world changed,
but you know, my own research and projects have advanced,
and I've got a whole bunch of new data that
I'm hoping to share with you this morning.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
All Right, we appreciate it. So again, I gave a
bit of a brief introduction. Do us a favor for
folks that have kind of just coming because we've had
a lot of folks tuned into the bi in since
the election has taken place, because people are definitely concerned
and a little bit more in tune with the news cycle.
(01:46):
Just a brief background on yourself, you know, outside of
the things that we discussed, you know where you grew up,
you know what kind of motivated you to kind of
walk this path you're on. And we'll get to the
good stuff.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
Yeah, So originally from Colorado, grew up Denver Boulder area
along the turnpike there and ended up staying home, receiving
my undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado, and then
I went off to grad school at the University of
Washington in Seattle in two thousand and seven, which means
that I was in my first year of grad school
(02:21):
in two thousand and eight when Obama ran and successfully
won President of the United States, and so I was
pretty much acculturated as a grad student, just really starting
to study politics in a very sort of advanced way
when we have the first black president, and that pushed
me wholeheartedly into wanting to understand and look at African
(02:43):
American public opinion, black attitudes, and political behavior. But all
throughout grad school I kept running into an issue. Studying
this in a very empirical and advanced way was difficult,
as there was not much data being collected or otherwise
on Black Americans, specifically in political science, but also across
(03:06):
all other disciplines, and so I worked on trying to
collect some data in grad school small parts of other projects.
But the first thing I did when I received my
first job in two thousand and fourteen coming out of
grad school was collect my own data, and I collected
a pilot study of battleground in swing states a little
(03:29):
over five hundred people. But that has now turned into
a continuous and ongoing project, the Black Voter Project, in
which I worked to collect as much data as possible,
and this last election cycle, I had the opportunity to
do a really really cool longitudinal survey where I collected
four waves of data attempting to survey the same people
(03:50):
at four different points throughout the election, one of those
points being just this past December after the election took place.
So I'm excited to share some of those results with you,
discuss how these findings kind of can help us understand
black public opinion and attitudes after the election, and maybe
what to expect looking forward.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Okay, okay, very good. So, you know, for folks that
don't know, you and I had a conversation just before
the election, Kamala Harris versus Donald Trump, and we broke
down a lot of the conversations that were taking place
surrounding that election. I remember, you know, black men's support
(04:36):
for Donald Trump being one of the things that we discussed,
or black men's support of the Republican Party, because that
was a hot button issue that was being debated at
the time. And I remember learning something profound from you
at that time. So before we get into those weeds,
let's start where I feel like you might want to
start share with us a bit of you know, maybe
(05:00):
two or three of the more surprising things that you've
learned or things that you think we would be interested
to know since the election. You know, what are some
things that have kind of made themselves apparent in the data.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
So I think, you know, there's pretty much three main
findings from the data that I'd like to point out,
the first being, following up on our pre election conversation,
you know, the post election results, the data collected in
December shows that black support for Harris did not fall off,
and Harris received almost exactly the same amount of support
(05:35):
that Biden did in twenty twenty from the black community,
and that that support amongst black men continued to grow
throughout the election cycle, and after the election we actually
see black men reporting to have supported Harris at rates
a bit higher than they did Biden in twenty twenty.
So those narratives around black support, you know, sort of
(05:56):
waning from Harris or even moving to Trump didn't baring
come true. Secondly, turnout did matter, though, and other analyzes
of census data looking at county level turnout suggests that
counties that had higher black populations had much lower turnout
than more white counties, and these differences were greater in
(06:18):
twenty twenty four than in twenty twenty. So it was
not about whether or not black people voted for Harris,
but again whether or not they actually voted at all. Yeah,
and so that's the first finding. The second finding has
to do with this understanding of what to expect going forward,
(06:39):
and really that there's a sense amongst the black community,
at least in the data that I collected, that politics
is sort of over for the time being. There's a
need to take a step back. There's less enthusiasm for
the Democratic Party, and a good era of Black people
(07:01):
pretty much just want to stay out of politics for
a little while and be left alone after the election.
And that's something that coupled with sort of the already
lower turnout rates, is going to be really difficult. But
the Democrats have to find a way to overcome that
going into twenty twenty six and twenty twenty eight, as
they depend on Black voters right as the backbone of
the party and the voters that continuously and consistently turn
(07:24):
out for Democratic candidates. And then lastly, though, when modeling
all of this and trying to understand what got black
people to turn out, it's very clear that those that
turned out were the ones who were most worried about
or anxious about this Trump presidency and kind of the
most informed about what could happen in terms of Project
(07:47):
twenty twenty five, the attacks on DEI, everything that we've
come to fruition. Right, if you knew about these things,
you were ware about these things, you were worried about
these things before the election, that was kind of one
of the most significant fasts driving people to vote. And
so looking forward, right, I've looked back. I've relied upon
some sort of experimental survey results where we tested different
(08:08):
statements and messages with voters and show them that, yes,
you can change people's minds about Trump. And the more
you change people's minds and get them to think, hey,
he is a danger, the more likely they're going to
come out to vote, regardless of all other things. Right,
no matter what you're talking to, men, women, young, old voters,
this works. That the Democrats, you know, in my opinion,
really need to make sure that they get this message
(08:30):
out and that people aren't just sitting back being like
I don't want to deal with politics anymore, that they
understand how important it is at this moment to fight
back and continue to resist and push forward. Otherwise it's
just going to continue to get worse.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Well, I'm going to I'm going to share some thoughts
with you, and I guess I just want you to
kind of reflect on them. I don't know that out
there will be a question here, but you know, you
mentioned that this election was shaped by more by people
(09:05):
black people and people in general, i'd imagine not voting
than by the folks who actually voted. Now, obviously the
folks that voted did shape the outcome, but there was
Donald Trump, for instance, won the popular vote as well
as the Electoral College with less votes than he ever
had in either of the prior to elections, and so
(09:29):
overall voter enthusiasm had waned. But when talking about black
people specifically, and you know how black people feel exhausted
on the other side of this election and are unenthusiastic
about the Democratic Party, I'm curious as to where that
(09:53):
comes from. Now. On the one hand, if I were
to imagine and this is I think think this is
where I want you to kind of step in and
just kind of interpret what data you have and the
conversations you've had, but I'll share my thoughts here. On
the one hand, I feel like maybe black folks are
(10:19):
just heartbroken in general about politics, right because we had
a Trump presidency and every day people had to wake
up like, oh, my god, what did you do today?
For four years and then there was the looming kind
of dark shadow being cast from Project twenty twenty five.
(10:42):
And then Donald Trump won, And I think in everyone's mind,
the bad guy doesn't win, but in a lot of
black folks mind, clearly, based on the data, Donald Trump
was the bad guy, right, and he won with all
the levers of government, with a full Supreme Court backing him,
you know, on and on. Oh, he was off the
leash to do whatever he wanted, and we were just
(11:03):
sort of at the mercy of that. So being exhausted
with politics in general, i'd imagine that might have been
part of that might have worked its way into Black
folks feeling unenthusiastic about the Democrats specifically, but you know,
politics in general. The other side of it, I would
imagine is that black people were particularly hurt because those
(11:29):
that showed up to vote for Kamala Harris. I'm not
talking about the low information people who you know, didn't
end up voting or voted the other way or whatever,
but those that voted for Kamala Harris ultimately knew that
despite her stance on Palestine or the administration at the
Times that stands on Palestine or whatever issues, that she
(11:50):
was the most qualified person for the job. She had
worked in all three branches of government. She just knew
what she was doing. She had served as the vice president,
was the most qualify if I had to represent the
interest in the United States, to represent the interest of
black people. She had an agenda for black men, the
whole bit right. And for a black woman to lose
to him, I think it showed just how deep racism
(12:17):
in the minds of black people. And I believe that
that's true the to a degree, just how deep racism
runs in this country for him to get be elected
over her. But what it doesn't show me, or what
I have not heard specifically, is the logic behind black
(12:39):
people I suppose turning against Democrats like it's very it's
all well and good to say, well, the Democrats have
never done anything for black people, when there is an
alternative that has done things for black people, But when
the Democrats. If the narrative is that Democrats have not
done anything for black people, and the alternative is Republicans
who have actively worked worked against black people, stripping away
(13:03):
measures that are intended to stabilize or reinforce, you know,
black folks that have been implemented in society over time.
I find that part troubling. And to see the Democrats
scrambling left and right at everyone's whim my own included,
because I've been critical of Democrats since the election, I'll
(13:24):
admit it, but they ran as solid a campaign as
they could, you know, in my opinion. And I don't
know what to make of the larger audience in terms
of that and the rest of these too. And you're
a person that you know clearly this is something that
we're all still struggling with. But you know, when you
(13:45):
have data, at least you can make heads or tails
of it, so you know your thoughts. There's no real
question there, but your thoughts on just kind of all
this whatever jumps out?
Speaker 3 (13:52):
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Speaker 1 (14:55):
We are here today with Christopher Towler, Associate Professor in
the Department of politicals Cients at California State University, Sacramento,
director of the Black Voter Project, and the editor in
chief of the Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Yeah, I think I'll start where you started with sort
of this question as to why in general, black people
are more apathetic, we're not engaged, and really, I mean
data suggest time and time again black people feel more alienated,
more disillusioned, have less trust in politics, have less trust
in politicians, and rightfully so, right, it's only been the
(15:34):
last fifty sixty years that we've seen full and equal
in corporation into politics through voting, through representation, and really
since the nineteen sixties, in the voting following the Voting
Rights Act, black Americans have really pushed not only for representation,
but for empowerment and to actually see representatives who can
get policy done and who can bring resources and things
(15:56):
back to the Black community. We've seen some representation. I
think the jury's still out on how much empowerment Black
people have through voting in traditional politics. But really, in
two thousand and eight and with the Obama years, that
idea of representation right came to a head because there
was now a black president, the ultimate sense of political
(16:17):
representation in the United States of America. However, coming out
of the Obama years, right, it was very clear that
there was a need for more empowerment and that there
was a good segment of Black America that felt like
Obama didn't do enough for Black people and that this
idea of representation kind of is empty without continued outcomes
or empowerment or policy that actually affects the black community. Right,
(16:41):
you can argue, how you know, for days as to
whether or not Obama's or how much Obama's policies actually
affect the black community, but that sentiment was out there,
and so right us studying this in political science, studying
black politics, we could tell very quickly that coming out
of Obama years in twenty sixteen, black turnout black enthusiasm
was not going to be the same. Right, it was
(17:03):
already waning during Obama's second term. There was a lot
of critique coming from some of the left black political
thinkers of Obama, and as we saw in twenty sixteen, turnout,
black turnout dropped significantly from twenty eight, two thousand and
eight and twenty twelve. Twenty twenty though, we kind of
saw a perfect storm right as you mentioned, four years
(17:23):
of Trump. People got to see the types of policies
and presidency that he was going to have or that
he had. But we also had George Floyd that summer,
and a lot of people really forget how much COVID
actually affected things as well and forced a lot of
states to expand there the ways that they allowed people
to vote, right, A lot of states allowed for mail
(17:44):
and voting sort of mail ballots and people to vote
in ways that they traditionally would is. So it made
it a lot easier to vote in twenty twenty as
well during COVID. And so this sort of perfect storm
of this Trump presidency, George Floyd and COVID boosted Black
turnout right not quite back up to twenty eight or
twenty twelve levels, but significantly higher than twenty sixteen, in
(18:08):
such a way that Biden was able to win. However,
right this past election, we didn't have that perfect storm.
We didn't have four years of Trump ingrained in our memory.
We didn't have a significant protest movement the summer before
the election, and a lot of states worked really hard
during the Biden era to make voting much more difficult. Right.
We saw that in states across the country, specifically states
(18:32):
like Texas, states like Georgia in particular, right a battleground
state put in a lot of restrictions limiting how people
can vote and when people can vote, and so those
elements then showed up this election cycle, and you're absolutely right.
I think it was a wake up call, especially for
those who really support Harris in the movement behind her, right,
(18:55):
those that came on the call after her announcement and
raised tons of money. It was a a punch to
the gut for those people in that group. And you know,
what ended up being an election that could have solidified
some sense of not only representation, but potentially empowerment in
the Democratic Party for Black Americans ended up sort of
(19:16):
lifting Black people up, especially those that supported her. But
then it all came crashing down pretty quickly. And you know,
as I look at the data, right, we asked people
how much they felt the Democratic Party was welcoming to
black people, and that continued to increase over the election cycle.
It started at about twenty eight percent saying the party
(19:38):
was extremely welcoming to black people in April when Biden
was the candidate, jumped all the way up to forty
two percent in October, right before the election, when Harris
was you know, full steam ahead. However, in December following
the election, it dropped about another ten points, back down
to four to thirty five percentage points. Right, and so
we see a reversal here in attitudes towards the Democratic
(20:00):
Party and black people. We also saw that when we
asked people whether or not a second Trump presidency would
motivate them to become more committed to politics, or if
a second Trump presidency would prove exhausting and they just
want to be left alone, right, Only twenty three percent
of people said it would motivate them, compared to forty
three percent who said it would be exhausting and they
(20:20):
just want to be left alone. And I think this
speaks to your point here. Of those that said it
would be exhausting and left alone, fifty one percent of
Black women felt this way. Yeah, a whole majority of
black women after the election of December said, you know,
a second Trump presidents is just going to be exhausting.
I'd rather be left alone rather than feeling motivated going
(20:42):
into you know, this presidency to work more. And so
all of those things mounting up really put us in
a position right now where the apathy, the exhaustion, even
the disillusionment with the Democratic Party our front and center.
And you know, I feel like there's a couple of
ways to attack that and get around it. But it's there,
it's undeniable. It's something that we have to deal with.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
Well while we're here, what I mean, what are your thoughts?
A couple of ways to attack that and get around
is sure.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
So, as I mentioned, when modeling all of this out
and actually looking at how some of these things influenced
turnout versus others, and so actually doing a more rigorous
analysis in comparing the influence of different factors to one another,
one of the most influential factors in determining whether or
(21:32):
not someone was going to vote was this idea of
political threat, whether or not Trump was a threat, whether
or not mag was a threat, even things like abortion right,
whether or not people saw abortion bands as a threat.
If they felt like there was a threat specifically to
the black community, they were more likely to turn out.
And again this was across the board. It didn't matter
(21:54):
if you're looking at men, women, young, old educated, college educated,
not college education. This idea of threat matters. And so
throughout these surveys we ran a number of experiments where
we asked people sort of different questions or gave people
different ways to think about politics, and then looked at
(22:15):
how that influenced their attitudes, and so, for example, at
one point we asked people whether or not they think
that black people must support the Democratic Party, and so
it was like a yes, you must support it. I
agree you must support this Democratic Party, or I disagree
we should, we don't have to support the Democratic Party.
We then took all of those people who said they
(22:37):
disagreed with this statement and gave them a couple of
statements to read. We gave them one statement that really
described Trump as a threat to the black community, pointing
out him and Maga's attempts to ban black history, to
eliminate DEI, to use you know, military to break up protests,
and really highlighted the way that Trump was a threat.
(23:00):
We then gave another statement to different participants that looked
at Harris as sort of a empowerment candidate, someone that
was going to be a black face for the Democratic
Party and potentially do things for the black community once
she got into politics. So we're trying to see if
either of these messages makes people feel more inclined to
(23:23):
support the Democratic Party of those that received the Harris
prime or the statement about Harris as being sort of
this black candidate for the Democratic Party eighty percent of
those who said they disagreed that blacks must support the
Democratic Party maintain that position, right. And so there was
about twenty percent of people who moved after getting this
(23:44):
statement about Harris and said, Okay, I disagreed that we
must support the Democratic Party, but after hearing about Harris
as the face of the party, now I agree. Right.
Of those that received the Trumps statement, though, forty percent
moved double twice as many people, yeah, move to saying Okay,
now I feel like I got to support the Democratic
Party after seeing what type of threat Trump represents.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Okay, so these are right, Okay, I see they're responding
to the threat.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
I can this couple? Right, This, coupled with the modeling
showing that these ideas of threat really move people, right, suggests,
at least from the research that we've been doing, that
the Democrats have to find a way to make as
many black people understand the threat that Trump represents if
his presidency doesn't do it alone. And again, right in
twenty twenty, we had this perfect storm where four years
(24:33):
of Trump, this protest movement COVID made it so that
the Democrats, probably regardless of their type of messaging, we're
going to win that election. It's you know, there's no
guarantee that that type of thing is going to happen again,
whether we look at the midterm elections or the presidency
of twenty twenty eight. And so Democrats in their messaging,
in their communication with their constituents, particularly Black constituents, have
(24:54):
to make this clear. They have to reach these low
information voters, these low propensity voters, and they talk to them.
They have to prioritize a message that shows how much
of a threat to the black community Trump, MAGA and
these policies are.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
This concludes part one of our conversation with Christopher Taller, PhD,
the director of the Black Voter Project, co founder of
Black Insights Research, and the editor in chief of the
Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics. Check back in with
us tomorrow for Part two, right here on the Black
Information Network Daily Podcast
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