As President Joe Biden campaigned in Atlanta, Georgia, over the weekend, just days before the Peach State’s March 12 presidential primary, his reelection bid was endorsed by three national organizations that represent Black, Asian, and Latino voters.
“This endorsement isn’t just deserving, it’s been earned,” Quentin James, the president of The Collective PAC, a committee which helps to elect Black officials nationwide, said at Saturday's Biden event, hailing Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris' accomplishments related to job creation, lowering health care costs and elevating Black women to the federal judiciary.
The group announced it is partnering with the AAPI Victory Fund and the Latino Victory Fund to launch a $30 million organizing effort to turn out communities of color for Biden.
In Georgia, more than 33% of the population is Black, a voting bloc that was key to Biden’s narrow victory (less than 12,000 votes) over then-President Donald Trump in 2020.
At Biden’s event Saturday, Black Georgians told Spectrum News they feel his campaign is doing ample outreach as the general election picks up.
“I think that there could be more, always," conceded Sherry Martin, "but I think that a lot of attention has been put there just because Black women show up in large numbers all the time, because we do see that our democracy’s on the line.”
Anita Hendricks felt similarly.
“Enough is being done, but there’s always more that can be done,” she said. “The Black base here in Georgia’s behind President Biden and we will continue to do so, particularly Black women.”
Trump was also in Georgia on Saturday, a dueling visit which highlighted the all but unofficial kickoff to the general election rematch between the former president and Biden. Trump rallied thousands of mostly white supporters in the small city of Rome, about 75 miles from Biden’s event.
While a majority of non-Black voters in Georgia favored Trump in 2020, several supporters told Spectrum News on Saturday they hope the former president tries to make inroads with the Black community this time around.
“I think just reaching out to the minorities and to the working class, the middle class, because we have to be built back up again,” said Bonnie Griffith, who is white.
As she waited in line to enter Trump’s event, Elaine Dawson, who is also white, applauded the Trump campaign’s efforts thus far.
“I think he’s reaching out to every genre of the population," she said. "Not just my age, but to the younger ones, to the Black population, the African Americans, every genre,” she said.
Vivian Childs, a former chair of the Georgia Black Republican Council, told Spectrum News there is outreach underway on behalf of Trump’s campaign by Black conservatives in the state.
“We are reaching people wherever they are, whether it be in the church, on the playground, in the schools. So we’re out there. And we’re carrying his words with us,” said Childs, who previously served as a director on the National Diversity Coalition for Trump.
Mykel Barthelemy, a Georgia-based Republican commentator who wrote the book, "TRUMP IS NOT A RACIST! Here's Why," said she beleives it’s harder for Republicans to engage with Black voters.
She also thinks Trump should visit inner cities to be more visible, and believes Trump’s legal troubles present an opportunity.
“Ever since Trump has been arrested and he got that mug shot, a lot of Black people have softened their hearts, for some reason, towards Trump,” she claimed. “Some people say because, ‘Oh, he’s just like us. He’s been treated unfairly by the justice system the same way that we were.’”
Eligible Black voters accounted for nearly half of Georgia’s electorate growth since 2000, according to the Pew Research Center. In order to win the state in November, both candidates will need Black voters’ support.