Hillary enjoyed widespread support among African American Democrats and was supposed to be the inevitable Democratic presidential nominee in 2008, then came Barack Obama and Hillary's attacks on him. That changed everything in terms of how blacks saw her and could carry over to 2016.
I leaned toward Hillary until it became apparent that then Senator Obama had a realistic chance to win the nomination after winning in Iowa. The two candidates didn't differ that much on policy, but I liked Obama because he did not vote for going to war in Iraq and of course, it would be something special to help elect a black President in my lifetime--something I never thought was possible.
However the thing that really pushed me toward him was my perception that with his ascendance, out of fear and necessity Hillary wrote off black voters and became the Democratic candidate for the angry, working class white voters that Republicans were also desperately courting.
Here are a few of Hillary's quotes from 2008 that seemed personal, mocking, even racial...seemingly questioning his work ethic and intellect that gave me and a lot of other black people pause about her:
"Speeches don't put food on the table. Speeches don't fill up your tank or fill your prescription or do anything about that stack of bills that keeps you up at night."
“The sky will open, the light will come down, celestial choirs will be singing, and everyone will know that we should do the right thing, and the world would be perfect.”
“Dr. King’s dream began to be realized when President Johnson passed the Civil Rights Act. It took a president to get it done."
Those attacks conjured stereotypes that appealed to some whites and turned off all blacks--with the possible exceptions of Clarence Thomas and Allen West.
But perhaps the single most damaging and unforgettable thing was when Hillary said this during an editorial board interview with the Argus Leader newspaper in Sioux Falls, S.D.:
"My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right?" Clinton said. "We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California."
I, along with probably 95 percent of other blacks, responded to that infamous quote by thinking a collective: "Oh no she didn't! This woman is so desperate she's mentioning assassination in the same sentence with the name of a black presidential candidate?!"
Most black people were finished with Hillary at that point and the negative feelings might carry over into 2016.
I get the sense Hillary is NOT the first choice for Democratic nominee for many African American voters going into 2016. A lot of people I talk to prefer Joe Biden or Elizabeth Warren. I'm still undecided. Time will tell.