Vice President Kamala Harris warned black men away from supporting Donald Trump for president, suggesting they were falling for a false promise that the former president cared about them.
Harris spoke about Trump and his appeal to black men in an interview released Monday with former NFL star Shannon Sharpe on his ‘Club Shay Shay’ podcast.
‘Don’t think you in Donald Trump’s club … you’re not. He not gonna be thinkin’ about you,’ Harris said. ‘You think he’s having you over for dinner?’
Harris appeared on the podcast and toasted Sharpe with a glass of Le Portier Cognac but said she would not drink it, citing the need to stay awake for a rally with former President Barack Obama later in the day.
Kamala Harris spoke about the election with former NBA star Shannon Sharpe on his podcast
Recent polls show Harris struggling with getting the same level of support by black men as her predecessors.
Surveys reveal Barack Obama getting 81 percent of black men age 18-44, with the share dropping to 63 percent under Hillary Clinton, 53 percent under Joe Biden, and 41 percent for Harris.
Harris argued that she cared more about black men because she was working to address colon cancer and prostate cancer, not Trump.
She said: ‘You think that when he’s going, when he’s with his buddies, his billionaire buddies, he’s thinking about what we need to do to deal with addressing, for example, my work around what I’m doing to address disparities in black men’s health around colon cancer, around what we need to do, around screenings, what we need to do around prostate cancer?’
Harris urged black men to ignore Trump’s place in popular culture and focus on who he would be as president.
‘Let’s not get distracted by who he was on The Apprentice, let’s not get distracted by whatever building in whatever city has his name on it,’ she said.
Harris specifically addressed the ‘myth’ that Trump sent individuals a stimulus check during the coronavirus pandemic, arguing that it was the black Democrats in the majority Democratic Congress that pushed them into law.
‘People like Maxine Watters, people like Hakeem Jeffries,’ she said. ‘Remember Congress holds the purse. Congress wrote those checks,’ she said.
Democratic presidential nominee U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris shares a toast with former NFL star Shannon Sharpe
She accused Trump of in the past refusing to rent property to black families, publishing an ad condemning the Central Park five, and reminded the audience of his ‘birtherism’ questioning of President Barack Obama’s birth certificate.
‘He has not earned the right to be president of the United States,’ Harris said.
She was defensive about her record as vice president, pointing to the ‘misinformation’ that was spreading online.
‘Just to be candid, I think that there is sadly misinformation out there about who I am and what I’ve done,’ Harris said. ‘Because if people are informed about fact, they will know that almost everything that I’m talking about doing as president is built on a foundation of work that I’ve been doing for years.’
She also pointed to Trump’s comment about immigrants stealing ‘black jobs’.
US First Lady Michelle Obama speaks during a rally with US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris at the Wings Event Center in Kalamazoo, Michigan
Former US President Barack Obama applauds US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris during a campaign rally at the James R Hallford Stadium in Clarkston, Georgia
‘Let me tell you what I define as a black job,’ she said. ‘Vice President of the United States,’ she said.
Harris and Sharpe sparred over her age, after he noted that she was a ‘couple of years older than myself,’ during a conversation about music.
The comment sparked a sharp reaction from the vice president.
‘C’mon now! I’m your guest!’ she said laughing. ‘Just keep moving cause I’m gonna give you a shovel in a minute!’
Harris has stepped up her outreach to black voters as a new TIPP Tracking Poll shows that Trump is making ‘significant inroads’ with black voters.
The poll showed an increase of eight points over the last two weeks among black voters supporting Trump. The TIPP tracking poll surveyed 1,288 likely voters.
Former President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama have also stepped up their campaign activity with black voters expressing their disappointment that black men would even consider voting for Trump over Harris.
Michelle Obama specifically spoke to black voters about voting for Trump, suggesting that it would be a betrayal of their ancestors on the issue of civil rights.
‘I am praying that those of us contemplating voting for Trump or not voting at all will snap out of whatever fog we are in,’ she said. ‘I am praying that we consider the decades of sacrifice and struggle by all of our ancestors, the folks who marched and sacrificed and shed their blood for us. We have to ask ourselves: Is a vote for Trump, or no vote at all, the way we honor their lives?’
Barack Obama sparked controversy earlier in October after he suggested that black men were being sexist or misogynist by refusing to support Harris.
‘Part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren’t feeling the idea of having a woman as president, and you’re coming up with other alternatives and other reasons for that,’ he said.
