Donald Trump is making his pitch to black voters. Again.
Just days after the shootings of Terence Crutcher in Tulsa, OK and Keith Lamont Scott in Charlotte, NC, the GOP presidential candidate expressed more empathy than self-aggrandizement when addressing the shootings. On Wednesday, Trump tweeted, “The situations in Tulsa and Charlotte are tragic. We must come together to make America safe again.”
Later, he tweeted for an end to the “violence and unrest” as protests broke out in Charlotte on Tuesday night.
Trump’s sentiments on social media are even being reflected on the campaign trail. At a rally in Kenansville, NC on Tuesday, Trump likened the inner cities to war zones like Afghanistan, saying, “African American communities are absolutely in the worst shape that they’ve ever been in before—ever, ever, ever.”
He continued on by highlighting the poor educational system, the lack of economic opportunities as well as the high crime rates with his trademark line, “What do you have to lose?”
When Trump attempted to persuade black voters near the end of August, he was polling in single-digits among African Americans. However, a poll released by the Los Angeles Times this past weekend (conducted between Sept. 10th-16th) showed that Trump jumped up 16.5 points from just over 3 percent to 19.6 percent. Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton had a near 20-point collapse in African American support.
This recent polling data came as a surprise to many, but, according to the LA Times bureau chief David Lauter, these polls should be taken lightly.
Lauter noted that Trump’s bump with black voters is nothing but a blip and that reading a daily tracking poll, such as the Daybreak survey, is “an object lesson in how not to read polls.”
As of Wednesday, Trump currently sits at 5.9 percent support from black voters from the LA Times’ survey, and is trending downwards. Despite the fluctuation in data, Trump has been surging in the polls overall.
In the latest Reuters/Ipsos national poll released on Wednesday, Trump leads Clinton by two points when factoring in the candidacy of Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein. In a head-to-head matchup in the same poll, Trump is tied with Clinton at 39 percent apiece.
If Trump keeps up this hot streak, Clinton’s support from black voters might start to give way for good.
