Former President Donald Trump launched a group this weekend designed to appeal to black voters as he seeks to win over those in a key demographic who could be disenchanted by President Joe Biden.
The Trump campaign issued the announcement Saturday, the same day Trump appeared in Detroit for a roundtable at a predominantly black church to discuss the new coalition.
He was accompanied at the event by two of his potential vice president picks, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) and former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson.
The Trump campaign touted in its statement that the former president had achieved more for black voters than any president in “recent history.” The campaign cited improved unemployment rates and increased median household income among black Americans, as well as new funding for historically black colleges and universities.
The campaign also highlighted criminal justice reform, a likely reference to the First Step Act, a bipartisan measure passed during Trump’s tenure that was aimed at reforming prison sentencing.
The campaign also announced dozens of black supporters of the new coalition, including Diante Johnson, president of the Black Conservative Federation.
“Donald Trump has done more for the black community than any other president since Abraham Lincoln,” Johnson said in a statement. “His America First agenda led to record-low inflation, closed borders and tripled the Black support for the Republican party.”
While black voters have historically overwhelmingly supported Democratic presidential candidates, Trump is seizing on recent polling showing Biden is faltering with a voting bloc that is critical to his 2024 bid.
A Marist poll conducted June 3 to 6 in battleground Pennsylvania found Biden leading Trump 68% to 23% among black voters, a more narrow lead compared to Biden’s performance in the 2020 election when he won, according to the pollster, 92% of black voters’ support.
That follows a Wall Street Journal poll finding in April that about 30% of black men in swing states planned to vote for Trump, a significant shift in Trump’s direction after AP VoteCast found Trump won 12% of the vote among black men in 2020.
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Trump’s announcement of the coalition comes on the heels of Biden hosting an early celebration of Juneteenth, a holiday that Biden signed legislation to federally recognize in 2021 to occur on June 19 to commemorate the end of slavery.
The event had “blatant political overtones,” according to the Associated Press, which noted the DJ listed out Biden’s own set of accomplishments for the voting bloc, such as canceling billions of dollars of college loan debts.
