I am attaching this story Bloomberg Article detailing the activities of Bruce Carter and his journey from Sanders to Trump supporter and how he allowed himself to be used to subvert the Black vote.
This story saddens (and infuriates) me on many levels. First, the breadth of the Trump efforts to undermine and suppress the vote in order to win. Second, that these efforts were effective. Third, that this person sold out the country, likely for money. Fourth, the lack of vetting by Facebook during the election cycle was egregious and continues to rankle.
I am editing or updating this diary as follows:
The article highlights how Carter was recruited by Cambridge Analytica’s and Breitbart. It also addresses how key campaign laws were undoubtedly broken as Carter never filed anything on his group “Trump for Urban Communities.” Money from various Republican sources flowed readily to Carter.
A central tenet to Carter’s communications with Black voters was the invocation of the slave mentality as key in the Democratic/Black relationship. Carter also communicated Bannon’s key suppression message:
“If you can’t stomach Trump, just don’t vote for the other people and don’t vote at all”
The end result of the election is that about 4 percent of Black women voted for Trump but up to about 14% of Black men did. I am not saying this is all attributable to Russia, the Republicans and Breitbart, but some of it is. And the Republicans and Russians understand, you just have to subvert a few votes in a few states. As an aside, I think a portion of the vote for Trump has to do with not just anti-Hillary sentiment but anti-female as President sentiment.
I added the Sanders information as descriptive but I did not write this diary to re-hash Bernie battles. Suppressing the Black vote is near and dear to my heart and I want to air this issue in order that we not repeat our mistakes.