For months now, the writing on the wall has said that Joe Biden has a problem with black voters in 2024. He'll still win the black vote in November — no one questions that — but poll after poll has shown that he's lost enough support from this reliably Democrat-voting demographic that it's hard to see how he can win the election. And his party may or may not be taking it seriously.
Back in January, Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) revealed that he was "very concerned" about Biden's standing with black voters. "Well, I'm not worried, I'm very concerned," he said. "I have no problem with the Biden administration and what it has done. My problem is we have not been able to break through that MAGA wall in order to get to people exactly what this president has done."
Clyburn has been doing what he can to help bring black voters back to the Democratic plantation. But, as NBC News noted at the time, they aren't listening. Young black voters in particular are more open to voting for Trump. Naturally, Clyburn was triggered by the revelation.
"I want them to stand in front of me and tell me they will support [Trump’s record] over Joe Biden’s record," Clyburn said of young black voters.
These days, however, Clyburn, who is largely seen as the man who saved Biden's 2020 presidential campaign by endorsing him before the South Carolina primary, now seems to be dismissive of the idea that Trump is gaining with black voters. He's saying that the polls are wrong.
"Despite a growing list of surveys that show Donald Trump gaining with Black voters, the longtime South Carolina Democrat and co-chair of President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign, dismissed suggestions Democrats should be concerned," says Politico.
“Something is amiss with the polling,” Clyburn claimed in an interview with Playbook Deep Dive podcast. “Anybody who believes that Donald Trump will get 30% of the Black male vote or 12% of the Black female vote — I got a bridge down there on Johns Island I’ll sell you.”
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Clyburn isn't the only one dismissing the polls showing Trump's historic gains with black voters, though. CNN's Harry Enten recently highlighted polls indicating Trump's support among black voters had surged from 9% to 21% since 2020, and Biden's had declined from 86% to 70%. CNN political commenter Bakari Sellers similarly sought to dismiss the data as "poor polling."
“If Donald Trump gets those numbers, then I truly believe that I can sell Harry this bridge in Brooklyn,” Sellers said. “That’s just not happening. I think that people have to just level set a little bit, relax a little bit, stop hyperventilating. Donald Trump is not going to get 20% of the black vote. He’s simply not.”
Sellers insisted, “Black voters aren’t going to all of a sudden — under the age of 50 or however old they are, because he gets four or five unnamed rappers from Detroit or four or five unnamed rappers from the Bronx to support him — they’re not going to all of a sudden, you know, flock to Donald Trump."
But CNN anchor Sara Sidner pushed back. “The numbers are the numbers, Bakari,” she told him. “I mean, are you saying you just don’t believe the polls? Or are you saying you don‘t think these polls will be representative of the population once voting begins in November?”
Sellers replied that he believes both. "I think what we've seen over the past eight years is pretty bad polling. And then I think what you've seen consistently since that time is individuals have a very difficult time acknowledging that we've had that polling, and the polling continuously gets worse. And so, I think that's one of the issues that we have."
While it's a fair point that Trump is unlikely to get 20% of the black vote, he doesn't need to get 20% for it to be a problem for Joe Biden. That seems to be what they don't understand.
