Corey D. Fields writes about 'What Black Republicans Care About' in the New York Times
In the Sunday Review of the New York Times, Corey D. Fields, writes about, 'What Black Republicans Care About':
IT is easy to laugh at the proverbial “black friend” invoked to neutralize charges of racism. However, the humor sours when you realize that this comical ploy is also a strategy the Republican Party uses in its outreach to black and moderate white voters.
Despite the whiteness of the G.O.P. in general — about 90 percent of voters in the Republican primaries this year have been white — a number of black Republicans hold prominent positions in the party, and are often held up as evidence of its commitment to diversity. Last year, for example, when the presidential candidate Ben Carson was doing well in the polls, his presence on the campaign trail helped prompt the chairman of the Republican National Committee, Reince Priebus, to claim that the G.O.P. was “likely to have the most diverse presidential primary field in history — of either party.”