Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., will use the first Democratic debate Tuesday night to reintroduce himself to black voters in the hopes of winning over this key piece of the Democratic vote.
“I think we’re going to talk about issues of importance to the black community,” Jeff Weaver, Sanders’ campaign manager, said Tuesday on CNN’s “New Day.”
“I think we’re going to talk about criminal justice reform. I think we’re going to talk about dealing with systemic racism. I think we’re going to talk about many of the economic issues that are important to African-American voters,” he said.
Sanders, who trails front-runner Hillary Clinton in most national polls but remains her toughest competitor, often speaks about the need to improve the economy for working class Americans.
“We’re raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour, [which] will give 50 percent of African-American workers a raise,” Weaver said. “These are issues that are obviously important to all of America, but in many cases because of the disproportionate amount of poverty in the African-American community, many of these issues will affect this community even more strongly.”
A Public Policy Polling survey found in early September that just 14 percent of black Democratic primary voters back Sanders, compared to Clinton’s 65 percent. Seventeen percent are unsure.
Sanders has struggled to improve those numbers so far. Black Lives Matter activists have interrupted numerous speeches of his this summer, claiming he was not paying proper attention to the issues black communities face. Since the more well-known interruptions at rallies in Arizona and Seattle, Sanders has met with Black Lives Matter activists and released a campaign platform on his website titled “Racial Justice.”
Prominent activist Cornel West has also endorsed Sanders because according to West, Sanders “is a long-distance runner with integrity in the struggle for justice for over 50 years.”
In a RealClearPolitics average of polls, Sanders sits behind Clinton (43.1 points) with 25.9 points.
