Entrepreneur and 2020 presidential candidate Andrew Yang lamented that he was the only person of color on the Democratic primary debate stage during Thursday night’s event.
Yang, 44, is the only person of color who qualified for the debate after Sen. Kamala Harris dropped out of the race, and Sen. Cory Booker, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro failed to qualify for the event.
“It’s both an honor and disappointment to be the lone candidate of color on the stage tonight. I miss Kamala [Harris], I miss Cory [Booker], but I think Cory will be back,” Yang began. “I grew up the son of immigrants, and I had many racial epithets used against me as a kid. But black and Latinos have something much more powerful working against them than words. They have numbers.”
“The average net worth of a black household is only 10% that of a white household,” he added. “For Latinos, it’s 12%. If you’re a black woman, you’re 320% more likely to die from complications in childbirth. These are the numbers that define race in our country. And the question is, why am I the lone candidate of color on this stage? Fewer than 5% of Americans donate to political campaigns.”
“You know what you need to donate to political campaigns? Disposable income,” Yang added before pivoting to promote universal basic income, one of his signature policy ideas.
