Politics
Mitt Romney not doing much to court African-American vote
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney campaigning. PHOTO/File
After a long primary season, Mitt Romney begins his contest with Barack Obama without having attracted any notable African-American endorsers, surrogates, or high-ranking campaign staffers.
So far, Romney’s highest-profile endorsement from an African-American supporter might be Aubrey Fenton, a former Burlington County New Jersey freeholder, and there are no African-Americans in the top ranks of the campaign. The two African-American Republicans in Congress, Tim Scott and Allan West, still haven’t endorsed the party’s nominee-apparent.
Romney, running against the first African-American president, has no chance of winning most African-American voters. But neglecting to court them at all sends the wrong message to swing voters, said political players and observers.
Romney’s problem, isn’t that African-Americans aren’t buying his message but that he hasn’t bothered to sell it to them.