Any time a candidate for president comes to Alabama we should be thrilled.
It gives them a chance to meet voters that normally don’t factor into presidential elections and it gives the state the chance to put its best foot forward.
But that’s not what 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s trip to Alabama was about.
He is here because he has no black support in a primary where black support is very important, so he comes to Alabama to rip on the state.
He swings by the National Memorial for Peace and Justice outside of Montgomery, not to learn anything, but to attack a fictional problem of “white supremacy.”
No one in the press dared to ask what he has done about this in his current position, or even what he will do if he becomes president. They acted like the dutiful scribes and staff photographers that they are so he can say, “I went to the lynching memorial” the next time his lack of black support is questioned.
And what better way to gain street cred nationally among black voters than to attack Alabama lawmakers for passing an abortion ban that the citizens of this state solidly support?
Buttigieg said, “What we see in Alabama unfortunately among legislators is a refusal to follow the law of the land.”
But this is not true.
Alabama lawmakers passed a law that was specifically meant to challenge the interpretation of the “law of the land,” which is, obviously, not a law at all but a Supreme Court ruling.
Supreme Court precedent is challenged all the time. He should know this.
Again, expecting the American press or their less competent Alabama counterparts to question him on these things is a mistake; they don’t have the knowledge necessary to do so.
But Buttigieg’s pandering was so broad he needed to be in the state for more than one day to get it all in.
While appearing at an event in Birmingham, he made the point that raising the minimum wage would disproportionately benefit non-white Americans.
How he reconciles that argument with his suggestion that we bring in more immigrants to compete with low-income workers is beyond me, but again, no one in the media seems interested in drilling down on these poorly thought-out arguments.
This is all just a PR trip and nothing more. Buttigieg is bumping up in some polls but is still struggling with black voters.
The first state with a large number of black voters is South Carolina, where he is polling fourth overall with 6% of the vote and a whopping 0% among black voters.
Remember why Buttigieg came to Alabama: It wasn’t to court voters here. It was solely to pander to black voters in other states.
Dale Jackson is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts a talk show from 7-11 am weekdays on WVNN
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