pete buttigieg
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Bernie Can’t Say Our Name, Beto Has No Shame, and Biden Can’t Be Tamed: 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 14
During a week where there is a Democratic debate the Power Rankings usually focus on who performed best, and how much time candidates spent speaking to issues and policies that concern African-American voters, but not this week. This whole committee was hit hard by the news that Rep. Elijah Cummings died early Thursday morning, and…
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Bernie Rises Above, Kamala Cries Like a Dove and Yang’s Got No Computer Love: 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 13
Earlier this week, Marcus Ferrell (former African-American outreach director for Bernie Sanders for America 2016, and senior adviser for Swing Left) sent me the following meme: It was perfect, actually, since in making the Power Rankings this week we caught a few candidates slipping. It seems like in the midst of crowing over new fundraising…
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SNL Does Kamala, Mayor Pete Starts to Holla and Booker Says ‘Can I Hold a Dollar?’: 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 12
This is by far one of the strangest weeks in the history of The Root Presidential Black Power Rankings. We had a mutiny within our committee, we had a special guest analyst who is just brilliant, and we had half a dozen major events occur this week that scrambled the rankings like an old-school Etch…
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Biden Gets Impeachment, Castro Talks High Rents and Booker's Totally Spent: 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 11
The Root 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings take a one-week snapshot of the campaign season and imagine, using just that week, which candidate running for president would be best for black America. Most weeks, we (me, Dr. Jason Johnson, politics editor of The Root; Marcus Ferrell, former African-American outreach director for Bernie Sanders for America…
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Beto Ain't So Woke, Harris Wants That Smoke and Yang Can Take a Joke: 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 10
In the immortal words of Bill Duke in Menace II Society: “You know you done fucked up, right?” That’s about the only way we can describe most of the Democratic candidates in the Black Power Rankings for week 10. It’s as if half the candidates forgot that there are black people out here who they…
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Live Blog: From Houston, the Democratic Debate at Texas Southern University
HOUSTON—Will Kamala Harris drag Joe Biden up to high heaven before her colored brethren at Texas Southern University? I don’t know if white men have edges, but I am sure the Senator from California will try and snatch Biden’s for sure. And will Cory Booker make another Kool-Aid reference? The youngins love Bernie Sanders, so…
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Castro Punches His Ticket, Harris Starts to Fidget and Yang Starts to Kick It: 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 8
We made it. After eight full weeks of Twitter spats, campaign gossip, polls and memes, we’ve reached our first bye week of The Root’s Presidential Black Power Rankings. Not only have the power rankings been a rousing success, with people eagerly anticipating each week, the engagement we’ve engendered (which is a polite way to say…
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To Improve Mental Health in Black America, We Must Empower Communities
We’re still struggling to reconcile historic trauma with the black experience in America. After years of systemic oppression, exclusion, and discrimination affecting generations of families, black America has been left to shoulder the burden of that trauma alone. It shows up when applying for jobs and facing disproportionate pay. It shows up in sentencing disparities…
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Castro Gives Trump a Slap, Harris Gets a New Rap, and Stacey Abrams Sets a VP Thirst Trap: The Root’s 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 7
“Smart white people know how to hire black people who actually KNOW black people.” Yours truly (Dr. Jason Johnson politics editor for the Root) and Marcus Ferrell, (former Black Outreach for Bernie Sanders in 2016) and the rest of the Power Rankings Committee came to this conclusion this week as we discussed which 2020 campaigns…
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Beto Goes Blue, Warren Wilts and Harris Goes O.G. AG: 2020 Presidential Black Power Rankings, Week 6
Mass shootings hit in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas; the stock market crashes; and Toni Morrison passes away. Why is it that every week of the Donald Trump presidency feels like a depressing opening scroll in some post-apocalyptic ’80s movie? In last week’s power rankings, we noted that in times of crisis, the committee…