America: We “Are” Going Back

By Jeffrey L. Boney, Associate Editor
Forward Times
Reprinted – by Texas Metro News

Republicans dominate 2024 Elections and Donald J. Trump is the President-Elect

“We are not going back!”

For months, Democrats uttered this catchphrase to motivate voters to reject the candidacy of former president Donald J. Trump, the controversial Republican nominee who was seeking to bounce back after being embarrassingly defeated by Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden in 2020.

While the catchphrase found its way onto T-shirts and was chanted at campaign rallies, it ultimately didn’t resonate.

After the results of the general election were announced, voters made it abundantly clear:

America—We “Are” Going Back!

Tuesday, November 5, 2024, was a true political blood bath.

A Republican red wave hit this country like a political tsunami, as president-elect Donald J. Trump won all seven closely watched battleground swing states that had been talked about leading up to the presidential election: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.  It wasn’t even close.

The Republicans took control of the U.S. Senate and are favored to retain the U.S. House of Representatives after all the votes are tallied in some too-close-to-call races in certain states.

Many Americans, especially many members of the African American community, are once again stunned by the outcome of the 2024 presidential election and are deeply concerned about what America will look like under a second-term Trump presidency.

But how did we get here…again?

Over 146 million people voted in the 2024 presidential election. Examining the data provides a full indication of how, despite everything he has said and done, Trump was re-elected.

EXIT POLLS

According to NBC News exit polling, 71 percent of the overall electorate were White (34 percent White men and 37 percent White women); 12 percent were Black (5 percent Black men and 7 percent Black women); 12 percent were Latino (6 percent Latino men and 6 percent Latino women); and 6 percent were other races.

Black people make up 14.4 percent of the population in the country, and White people continue to be the majority in the country at roughly 75 percent of the population.

There has been considerable criticism directed at Black men, but considering Black men only made-up 5 percent of the overall electorate, let’s delve deeper into the data.

White people and Latino men overwhelmingly re-elected Trump as president and contributed to the Republican wave that impacted all elections, nationally and across the states.

According to the NBC News exit polling:

• 57 percent of White people voted for Trump
• 60 percent of White men voted for Trump
• 53 percent of White women voted for Trump
• 55 percent of Latino men voted for Trump
• 38 percent of Latino women voted for Trump
• 46 percent of all other races voted for Trump
• 21 percent of Black men voted for Trump
• 7 percent of Black women voted for Trump

The reality of who voted for and who wanted Trump in office is clear, based on the data.

TRUMP 2.0

Let’s face it!

President-Elect Donald J. Trump is about to show you better than he can tell you.

If the Republicans successfully retain the U.S. House of Representatives, Trump will do whatever he wants.  He has already told the nation many of the things he plans to do, so there should be no surprises when they are introduced and when it eventually goes down. 

Americans should be extremely concerned. 

Back in July, Trump said the following to a conservative group in Florida:

“Christians, get out and vote, just this time. You won’t have to do it anymore. Four more years, you know what, it will be fixed. It will be fine; you won’t have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians.”

That is extremely concerning rhetoric coming from anyone who holds a position of authority.

On top of that, several, if not all, of the Democratic policies that have been implemented to cure and aid the African American community will be gutted and overturned.  Be sure of it. 

So, how will Trump 2.0, impact the African American community?

One of the most significant issues impacting the African American community is the potential repeal of the Affordable Care Act. President-elect Trump and Republicans have consistently stated they will not support continuing the assistance provided to people who wish to purchase health insurance through the Affordable Care Act.

If Trump and Republicans follow through on their campaign promise, approximately 4 million people will no longer have insurance coverage in 2026, because they won’t be able to afford it, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which is a nonpartisan agency that provides budget and economic information to Congress. The CBO also estimates that every year, thereafter, more people will fail to have health insurance due to skyrocketing insurance costs.

PROJECT 2025 IS ON DECK

In an article published in the Forward Times last month entitled ELECTION 2024: NO TURNING BACK, the significance of the Project 2025 agenda was discussed and key points from the 922-page document were highlighted that will impact African Americans, such as:

• Limiting Access to Quality Education for Black Students: Project 2025 will exacerbate the education and wealth gap for Black students and workers by dismantling the Department of Education; expanding the ongoing, coordinated attack on truth in schools and libraries; and making higher education even more inaccessible for Black students by privatizing student loans, and eliminating student loan forgiveness programs.
• Promoting Punitive Criminal Legal Policies: Project 2025 will endanger Black communities by likely increasing the use of the U.S. racially discriminatory death penalty and rolling back efforts to address police misconduct for constitutional and civil rights violations.
• Jeopardizing Access to Affordable Housing for Black Families: Project 2025 will transfer control of critical housing programs to expand access to affordable housing, like Section 8, to states—including those with a history of racial discrimination—threatening the housing stability of millions of Black low-income families.
• Undermining Black Political Power: By overhauling the U.S. Census Bureau and criminalizing election-related offenses, Project 2025 will weaken the political influence of Black communities by undercounting them and suppressing the Black vote through threats and intimidation, destabilizing the key foundations of our multiracial democracy.
• Weakening Anti-Discrimination Laws and Cutting Essential Worker Protections: Project 2025 will eliminate key safeguards that protect Black workers and bar federal agencies from collecting racial demographic data, making it harder to enforce anti-discrimination laws and combat racial inequities, especially in the workplace.
• Threatening Reproductive Rights and the Health of Black People: Black pregnant people, who already face disproportionately high maternal mortality rates, would be hit the hardest by Project 2025’s restrictions on reproductive health care, which include proposals to ban federal access to abortion care and criminalize health care providers.
• Exacerbating Health Disparities Caused by Environmental Racism: By shutting down the Office of Environmental Justice, Project 2025 will allow the federal government to turn a blind eye to the persistent and increasing environmental racism that is causing severe health disparities in Black communities, leaving Black people even more vulnerable to pollution and hazardous living conditions.

Other ultra-conservative parts of the controversial Project 2025 agenda include eliminating:

• The Head Start program, which is a federal program that provides preschool care and education to low-income families
• Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs in each area of the federal government
• Access for African Americans and women to receive direct small business loans from the Small Business Administration (SBA) in order to start and/or grow their businesses
• Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights, a sub-agency that enforces civil rights laws and investigates schools accused of engaging in discrimination
• Agencies that run Medicare and Medicaid, as well as affiliated offices that research treatments for insidious diseases and approve prescriptions, medical devices, and personal products like cosmetics

BIDEN-HARRIS 2020

In 2020, Joe Biden won all, but one, of those seven swing states (North Carolina) and the Democrats were able to gain control of the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate.

With Biden winning the presidency, and the Democrats controlling both chambers of Congress, they were able to enact some significantly impactful bills into law, such as the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), Inflation Reduction Act, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, CHIPS and Science Act, Postal Service Reform Act, Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act, Respect for Marriage Act, and much more.

There were also things that occurred during the Biden administration’s nearly four years that gave Republicans the “red meat” needed to galvanize their Republican base. 

According to ABC News exit poll results of the 2024 election, 45 percent of voters stated that the economy has gotten worse under the Biden-Harris administration, as well as their own family’s financial situation, versus how they fared during Trump’s first term.

REPUBLICAN MESSAGING

Let’s be clear: Democratic candidate Kamala Harris ran as flawless a campaign as any national candidate could, especially given the short timeframe in which she answered the call to run for the most important political seat in the nation.

But now, let’s examine the contrast to see what went so wrong.

Several key issues took center stage in Republican messaging against Kamala Harris, the Biden administration, and the Democratic Party. This messaging focused on the economy, immigration and the border, foreign policy, replacing Democratic judges labeled as ‘soft on crime,’ and transgender rights.

A myriad of blistering television ads flooded the airwaves every commercial break, focused on all of those Republican talking points.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Party didn’t seem to have any messaging focused on their own policies; instead, they appeared to be playing defense on the areas where they had become vulnerable.

This perfect storm impacted the presidential race, statewide races, and county races all across the country, including here in Harris County and Fort Bend County.

In Harris County, Republican judicial nominees won 28 out of 36 contested judicial races this presidential election year. Several of the “Black Girl Magic” judges from 2018 lost their re-elections and Fort Bend County Judge Tameika Carter lost a tough battle for re-election in her contested race. Again, the Republican messaging was consistent and effective.

HINOJOSA RESIGNS

After an embarrassing statewide showing, Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa announced that he was resigning and issued the following statement:

“On Tuesday, the Democratic Party suffered devastating defeats up and down the ballot in Texas and across the country. Voters sent a clear message to our party and our country that they want our leaders to talk to them about issues that they care about most, including the economy. Democrats delivered infrastructure funds to rebuild roads, bridges, ports, and airports. Democrats passed the most important climate investments in history. And though Democrats delivered one of the best economies our country has had, Americans just aren’t feeling it.

In the days and weeks to come, it is imperative that our Democratic leaders across the country reevaluate what is best for our party and embrace the next generation of leaders to take us through the next four years of Trump and win back seats up and down the ballot. That is why today I’m announcing that I’ll be stepping aside in the new year at the Spring SDEC meeting in March 2025, and passing the torch to the next generation. While this was a hard decision, it is the best decision for our party, and I encourage our national leaders and party leaders at all levels to join me in lifting up the next generation in order to unite our party as we take on Donald Trump.”

Acknowledging that new messaging and new leadership is needed is a start, but it isn’t the full answer.  There must be a Democratic platform that embraces their most consistent voting bloc and their most loyal base—African American voters.