Pete Buttigieg courts black vote at Morehouse College event

Pete Buttigieg is counting on a win in the Iowa caucus to settle the electability question among minorities.

Pete Buttigieg meets students at Morehouse Collage in Atlanta on Tuesday. Picture: AP

Democratic presidential candid­ate Pete Buttigieg told a crowd at Morehouse College on Tuesday that what black voters on the campaign­ trail most want to hear from him is whether he can win and what he is going to do for black America.

Buttigieg told the audience of about 250 people at the historic­ally black, all-male college in Atlanta­ that a strong showing in mostly white Iowa could help persuade black voters that he can win.

Polls have shown that Butti­gieg, the white mayor of South Bend, Indiana, has risen into the top tier in Iowa, which hosts 2020’s first presidential caucuses.

“One of the best ways to settle the question of electability is to do well in an election,” he said. “Iowa is a way to demonstrate that you can get people to come out for you.”

But as he gains momentum in the overwhelmingly white early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire, unless his campaign can broaden its reach to minor­ities, he could stall in more diverse states such as Nevada and South Carolina. The pressure is building on him to demonstrate he can win over black voters, who for now have largely sided with former vice- president Joe Biden.

Buttigieg, 37, has stumbled on race, despite having a detailed polic­y to address systemic racism.

On Tuesday, he discussed his Douglass Plan — named for abolitionist Frederick Douglass — that aims to redress generations of inequality ranging from education to housing to healthcare.

He also took questions on such issues as voter suppression, funding for historically black colleges, student debt and impeachment.

Kaori Anderson-Walker, 19, had heard a bit about Buttigieg on social media but came to Tuesday’s forum to learn more. He thought the mayor was “phenomenal”. “The way he’s looking out for the black community is much needed,” said Anderson-Walker, who said he was undecided on who he plans to vote for but could see supporting Buttigieg.

John Gray spoke to Buttigieg after the forum about the Douglass Plan. After taking a selfie with the mayor, Gray acknowledged that his initial impression of Buttigieg based off social media and friends was that he was a “phony”, a perception he said wasn’t disproved by the candidate’s speech.

“He has a lot of sympathy for black issues, but, as we saw tonight, he wasn’t the most clear on his plans,” said the 18-year old politic­al science major who said he likes Bernie Sanders but will support whoever is the eventual Democratic nominee.

Buttigieg has risen into the top tier in Iowa, which hosts 2020’s first presidential caucuses, challenging his better-known rivals Elizabe­th Warren, Biden and Sanders­. Polls show similar traction for him in New Hampshire, home of the first 2020 primary and where he has built a robust campaign organisation and travelled regularly in recent weeks.

Warren and Sanders are also struggling to woo black voters away from Biden.

Since entering the national spotlight, Buttigieg has drawn attenti­on for his handling of race issues as mayor of South Bend, which has a black population of about 27 per cent. Critics slammed him for firing the city’s first black police chief shortly after taking office­, for his handling of blighted neighbourhoods and for a recent police-involved killing of an unarmed­ black man.

Last week, his campaign faced fresh scrutiny for using a stock photograph of a black woman and her child on a campaign website, instead of images of people Buttigieg had met, and for listing among South Carolina Democrats who had endorsed the Douglass Plan a handful of people who said they had not given their permis­sion to use their names publicly.

Julian Hemmings, president of the New Deal Democrats at Morehouse, said Buttigieg’s status as a gay man could help voters of colour­ who have felt ostracised identify with him.

Buttigieg during his stint in Afghanistan as an intelligence officer.

The Rhodes scholar is also leaning hard on his seven-month deployment as an intelligence ­officer in Afghanistan as a powerful credential, but is walking a narro­w path between giving that service its due and overstating it.

As his support grows, Buttigieg can expect greater scrutiny of his military record in a climate where service is far from sacred.

He’s careful to not call himself a combat veteran, even as he notes the danger he faced.

AP