This wasn’t supposed to be remotely hard; in fact, the groundwork had already been laid down. It works like this: Black women are the backbone of the Democratic party and they needed to be rewarded with a vice-presidential pick in this upcoming election.
And the presumptive Democratic nominee for president still hasn’t made his pick, which has me thinking two things: 1) Joe Biden is going to fuck this up and 2) Joe Biden is going to fuck this up.
I’m not alone in these feelings, as some 100 Black celebrities and leaders have called for Biden to pick a Black woman as his running mate, a decision that was supposed to be made a week ago and as of Aug. 10 still hasn’t been made.
Yahoo News reports:
Entertainment mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs, radio personality and “The Breakfast Club” co-host Lenard “Charlamagne Tha God” McKelvey, former NFL defensive end Michael Bennett, civil rights lawyer Benjamin Crump and many others signed the open letter to Biden.
“As someone who has said throughout the campaign that VP Joe Biden needs to choose a Black woman VP, the urgency for that pick has gone from something that SHOULD happen to something that HAS to happen,” the letter said.
The letter denounced the treatment of some of Biden’s potential picks, including Sen. Kamala Harris over her perceived ambition and her debate attacks on Biden’s civil rights record when she was a rival candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.
“It disgusts us that Black women are not just being vetted in this VP process but unfairly criticized and scrutinized,” the letter said. “Was Joe Biden ever labeled ‘too ambitious’ because he ran for president three times? ... Why does Senator Kamala Harris [D-Calif.] have to show remorse for questioning Biden’s previous stance on integrated busing during a Democratic primary debate?”
Wait, looking through some of the names of the men that have signed this letter is just as problematic, considering that “Charlamagne Tha God,” frequent doo-doo hat-wearing Nick Cannon, and CNN political contributor and possibly one of Trump’s Blacks Van Jones have all signed.
Managing Editor Genetta Adams: So, I’m confused, because just over the weekend, Nick Cannon endorsed Kanye.
Me: You know who else is confused? Nick Cannon.
Diddy and Charlamagne Tha God have pushed this whole thing of holding the Black vote for ransom, basically claiming that they’d need an agenda of how Biden plans to improve the lives of Black and brown people if he wants the “Black vote,” Black Enterprise reported. But, much like politicians, we don’t hear much from these niggas until election time.
Harris is reportedly leading the pack along with former Obama administration national security adviser Susan Rice. Other prominent names include Rep. Karen Bass of California, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Rep. Val Demings of Florida, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Sen. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois, USA Today reported. Harris, Rice, Bass and Demings are Black. And Biden is totally going to fuck this up. Why is he even entertaining these other names when he clearly knows what he needs to do—and what the fuck is taking so long?
Whitmer traveled to Delaware last weekend to meet with Joe Biden, and myself and apparently the active political operative Diddy would also like to know why? Why is she in Delaware? Does she have a home there? Was she looking for a pandemic place to lay low?
The Associated Press reported that the trip is an indicator that Whitmer’s on Biden’s shortlist and hopefully that shortlist is white women who don’t know why a man named Leh-nard (Monique Judge-voice) calls himself “Charlamagne.”
“Failing to select a Black woman in 2020 means you will lose the election,” the letter said. “We don’t want to choose between the lesser of two evils, and we don’t want to vote the devil we know versus the devil we don’t because we are tired of voting for devils—period.”
Yahoo notes that hundreds of Black women signed an open letter in April asking Biden to choose a Black woman as his vice president.
“...We the undersigned Black women leaders from a variety of backgrounds and experiences, from both the public and the private sectors, who have all, time and time again supported the Democratic party nationally and across the country—are writing to recommend and encourage you to recognize and seize this moment in our country’s history, and its bold future, by selecting a Black woman to serve as your vice presidential running mate,” the letter said.
Biden is expected to make a decision this week.
He is totally going to fuck this up.
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