Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden confirmed Tuesday that California Sen. Kamala Harris will be his running mate for the upcoming election in the fall. This comes after intense pressure for Biden from various critics to choose a Black woman as his vice president pick. However, a new survey shows there are still some Black Americans who aren’t sold on electing Biden as president.
While Biden has proven to have strong support among older Black voters, young Black voters are still elusive. According to data collected by American University, only 47% of Black Americans under 30 years old surveyed confirmed that they would be voting for the presumed Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden, this November in comparison to 70% for Black Americans between the ages of 30-59. Seventy-three percent of respondents under 30 said they would vote for Biden in the upcoming presidential election.The data further highlights the generational differences go beyond views on Biden but the Democratic Party and election process overall. The study found that 47% of Black Americans under the age of 30 believe that the Democratic Party is welcoming toward the community compared to 77% of Black Americans over the age of 60. Twenty-seven percent of Black Americans under 30 were welcomed by the Republican Party compared to 7% of Black Americans over 60.
Young Black Americans have also been more critical of remarks made by Biden, including when he recently he implied that the African American community isn’t as diverse as the Latinx community.
“Unlike the African American community with notable exceptions, the Latino community is an incredibly diverse community with incredibly different attitudes about different things,” he said during a video interview.