On Friday, a CNN talker noted the failings of a 2020 Democratic hopeful.
Strange day.
“Noted the failings,” that is, where it concerns his popularity among black voters.
Currently, Pete Buttigieg stinks.
The Axe Files’s David Axelrod made the observations during a discussion with news anchor John Berman.
John remarked that the small-town Indiana mayor “absolutely” has no chance to win the presidency without the support of black Americans.”
And he most certainly does not have it.
From Axelrod:
“Absolutely cannot. Absolutely cannot. African-Americans are about a quarter of the Democratic primary electorate. Once you clear those early states of Iowa and New Hampshire, they come into play. And in South Carolina, 60 percent of the voters will be African-American. So, as a practical matter, he has to solve this problem or he’s going to go back to South Bend. And that’s a problem.”
Right. He isn’t taking care of business at home: Pete’s vacated his mayoral office to run for president, and some people haven’t appreciated it.
CNN’s David Axlerod highlights how African-Americans are doing worse in South Bend under Pete Buttigieg. pic.twitter.com/Bvcth58jzM
— Steve Guest (@SteveGuest) July 12, 2019
While he was out trying to change jobs in June, a white police officer shot a black man and chaos ensued.
Pete rushed back for damage control, but his town hall turned into YellFest 2019.
Even the gals at The View were unimpressed.
At the time, Joy Behar offered something which, to me, seemed perfectly sensible:
“[I] have this feeling that these guys who are running who are mayors and governors should keep doing their jobs — until they can fix — it’s almost like…when you’re the mayor or a governor, it’s almost like being the father or the mother of the family. And to leave South Bend now and run for president seems like an unfinished job.”
Former Obama Senior Advisor David appears to agree:
“South Bend itself is a bit of a problem for him because even though he has this very far-reaching Douglass Plan to try and fight systemic racism in this country, there are troubling issues back home about police staffing, which African-Americans dropped by half under his watch, and on city contracting, where African-American — where minority businesses have done rather poorly in sharing in the business of the city, even though 40 percent of the city is black and Hispanic. These are questions that I asked him.”
How’s he gonna lead the country if he can’t satisfactorily run South Bend?
Pete’s smaller problems are his bigger problems:
“And, you know, he had a series of issues. He fired a popular black police chief. It was because of an investigation. But, nonetheless, it was a controversial decision. He tore down 1,000 abandoned homes, many of them in poor minority communities, and that was meant to remove blight. But there was quite a bit of resistance because now there are these vacant lots in the community. So, you know, there are a lot of issues that he has to confront there.”
It’s not so often you see CNN downgrade a Democrat.
I wrote a while back that the lead-up to 2020’s gonna be interesting on the other side of the aisle. And so far, it hasn’t disappointed. CNN’s saying a Democratic can’t take care of business with the black citizenry, and AOC and Pelosi are in the ring among other infighting (here and here).
Keep out your popcorn; I think it’s gonna get weirder.
-ALEX
Relevant RedState links in this article: here and here.
See 3 more pieces from me:
Find all my RedState work here.
And please follow Alex Parker on Twitter and Facebook.
Thank you for reading! Please sound off in the Comments section below.
If you have an iPhone and want to comment, select the box with the upward arrow at the bottom of your screen; swipe left and choose “Request Desktop Site.” If it fails to automatically refresh, manually reload the page. Scroll down to the red horizontal bar that says “Show Comments.”
Join the conversation as a VIP Member