US President Barack Obama says the African American turnout in favor of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has been less than “solid” among early voters.
During his appearance on the Tom Joyner Morning show on Wednesday, Obama said he was satisfied with the Hispanic vote but African American communities need to show more support for Clinton.
“I’m going to be honest with you right now, because we track, we’ve got early voting, we’ve got all kinds of metrics to see what’s going on, and right now, the Latino vote is up. Overall vote is up,” Obama said. “But the African-American vote right now is not as solid as it needs to be.”
America’s first black president, who has tried his best to line up his African American admirers behind Clinton, said Clinton’s color of skin should not kill the enthusiasm that earned him the victory for two terms.
“I know that a lot of people in the barber shops and the beauty salons and, you know, in the neighborhoods who are saying to themselves, ‘well you know, we love Barack. We especially love [First Lady] Michelle. And so it was exciting and now we’re not excited as much,’” the outgoing president said.
“So if you really care about my presidency and what we’ve accomplished, then you are going to go and vote,” he added.
Obama also took a jibe at Trump by warning voters that if the New York businessman gets elected, he will “reverse everything I’ve done over the last eight years, reverse everything Michelle’s done over the last eight years.”
Trump has historically low support among African-American voters, according to most polls. A NBC/Wall Street Journal poll released in September showed the candidate polling at 7 percent among black voters, while Clinton had 81 percent support.
Obama has tried his best to get African Americans rally around Clinton by using his own popularity among them.
Trump, on the other hand, has tried to turn the tide in his own favor by reminding African Americans that they “have nothing to lose.”
He claims America’s black communities should vote for him if they want to end poverty, unemployment and failing schools.