Truth vs. Spin
26th October 2020 · 0 Comments
By C.C. Campbell-Rock
Contributing Columnist
Paris Dennard, the Republican National Committee’s senior communications advisor for Black media affairs, sent out an attack letter suggesting five questions that Black voters should ask Kamala Harris. Interestingly, all of the questions are slanted attacks on former VP Joe Biden’s senatorial record from the 1970s and his positions on issues.
The way the questions are poised leaves out the context in which Biden made the comments attributed to him. Some of the questions are outright spin which are inconsistent with the truth. Dennard is a Trump supporter and one of a few paid Black Republican consultants.
Although some of the questions posed by Dennard have already been litigated in the press, lets take a deep dive into the facts, to cut the spin, and find the truth regarding Biden’s positions.
Q: Should Black Americans be offended by Joe Biden being against school choice, charter schools and saying busing and school integration would lead to his children growing up in a racial jungle?
Biden never said he was against charter schools or school choice. Trump lied when he said Biden wants “to end school choice” and “abolish charter schools.”
Biden is on record opposing federal funding of “for-profit charter schools.” Although Biden opposes vouchers for private school tuition, he is not against school choice. He believes students should have the right to choose between public schools, magnet schools and high-performing charter schools.
During a 1977 Committee of the Judiciary hearing “Busing of School Children,” Biden went on record opposing federally mandated busing to integrate schools. “Unless we do something about this, my children are going to grow up in a jungle, the jungle being a racial jungle with tensions having built so high that it is going to explode at some point.”
In his opening statement, Biden, the chair of the committee, said, “The dilemma we face is that we must develop a statute which is not only constitutional but will be effective in eliminating or at least limiting busing in cases that are going on across the Nation, including in my own State. At the same time that we are addressing legal issues we also intend, during these hearings, to focus on fundamental sociological and political questions of whether busing is a good social policy.
“I can say – although some, now, because of my strong opposition to busing begin to question my credentials in the Civil Rights Movement and my credentials in support of the Black community – I am one who comes from that side of the street as a defense lawyer and I have come. It is my firm belief that the vast majority of Americans who are vehemently opposed to busing are not opposed to the thrust of Brown v. the Board of Education – the ruling in 1954.
“I think we are forging a new consensus. I think that consensus is one which recognizes that we must continue a commitment to the problems of Black America, but we must recognize that busing is one of those counterproductive means. We still have a good deal more to do. We still have a good deal more to do to ensure that Blacks maintain and achieve their rightful place in society. However, mandatory busing is not a method which advanced that goal, in my opinion.”
Biden suggested that a better remedy would be fully funding all schools, upgrading school facilities in children’s neighborhoods and/or affordable housing programs in suburbia. “You may recall when I was in the county council trying to place public housing in suburbia. I think if we had some of that, if we had talked about statewide property tax for school districts, if we had done a lot of other things, we might not be faced with potential social dislocation,” he said.
Biden advocated achieving racial integration through affordable housing rather than busing. The quote has been taken out of context, and hence the claim is misleading.
Q: Should Black Americans forget the negative impact of Joe Biden’s 1994 Crime Bill on the Black family, community, and generational wealth?
No, Black Americans should not forget the impact of the crime bill on the Black family and Black communities. As for generational wealth, throwing that into the question creates a false equivalence.
Black people who have not been incarcerated are still oppressed by systemic racism in hiring and financial redlining that prevents them from acquiring wealth, real estate and passing assets on to the next generation. Anti-racism laws must be enforced, and systemic racism eliminated before most Black people can create generational wealth.
So, Black Americans must never forget the injustices perpetratrated against them, especially by lawmakers, whether on local, state or federal levels.
However, when a person accepts responsibility for his or her wrongful actions, then, to err is human and to forgive is divine.
Biden said at the National Action Network’s Martin Luther King Jr. breakfast in January 2019, “I haven’t always been right. I know we haven’t always gotten things right, but I’ve always tried.” He called his support for the 1994 crime bill, which President Bill Clinton signed into law, “a big mistake.”
Biden’s spokesman, Bill Russo, added the crime bill included funding “to keep individuals who committed first-time offenses and non-violent crimes out of prison and instead in treatment and supervision,” and that Biden advocated for prevention funding. Russo also pointed to two provisions of the bill that led to Biden’s strong support of its passage: bans on high-capacity magazines and assault weapons and the Violence Against Women Act.
Q: The last two Democrat candidates for president referred to Black men as either “super predators” or “predators.” How should Black female voters reconcile their support for candidates that have spoken publicly about their children like that?
In this question, Dennard wrongly conflated Biden’s characterization of crime-prone people on the streets with Hillary Clinton’s “super predators” comment, for which she has apologized.
Dennard’s posing of this question followed Trump’s claim at the recent debate that Biden called Black Americans “Super predators,” which was a flat out lie.
Biden did use the word “predators,” however, when pushing the crime bill in the 1990s. “We have predators on our streets that society has in fact, in part because of its neglect, created,” said Biden. “Biden has since apologized for his role in tough-on-crime legislation passed in the 1980s and ‘90s by large bipartisan margins. Biden said those bills “trapped an entire generation,” and that “it was a big mistake when it was made,” according to news reports.
Q: You have said you support the women like Tara Reade that have accused Joe Biden of assault. Should it bother Black voters that you are now standing with Joe Biden, giving him a second chance while so many Black men do not get the same treatment?
“I believe them, and I respect them being able to tell their story and having the courage to do it,” Harris said of women, during her presidential run, who said they felt uncomfortable with Biden touching them. For example, in March 2019, Lucy Flores, a former state lawmaker from Nevada, accused Biden of grabbing her shoulders and kissing her on the back of her head at a campaign event. Following that, six other women came forward to share stories of unwanted touching by Biden.
At that time, none of the allegations included rape or sexual assault.
Biden said his touching was about making “a human connection,” but vowed to be more “mindful and respectful.”
Tara Reade’s conflicting accounts have raised the possibility of whether her allegations are true.
She first offered conflicting stories about why she left her job in Biden’s Senate office in 1993. According to news reports, she told one colleague she was being let go for an unfair reason – that she was being terminated because of a medical issue she had been dealing with. Reade’s own writings offer yet other reasons for why she left Biden’s office – and ultimately Washington. In one deleted Medium post, she said she “resigned” to pursue acting and writing, and also because she was tired of the U.S. government’s “deception and xenophobia.” In another since deleted post, Reade wrote that she left Washington and returned to the Midwest so her then-boyfriend could manage a congressman’s campaign.
Finally, Reade seems to have, or have had, a strange obsession with Russian President Vladimir Putin. In an op-ed posted on Medium in 2018, she wrote, “President Putin has an alluring combination of strength with gentleness. His sensuous image projects his love for life, the embodiment of grace while facing adversity.”
It wasn’t until Biden began running for president, in March 2020, that Reade leveled charges of sexual harassment and sexual assault. While several acquaintances later said Reade told them confidentially about the assault in the 1990s, others said she only had good things to say about then-Senator Biden.
Reade is being represented by a prominent lawyer and political donor to Donald Trump’s 2016 Republican campaign. Attorney Douglas Wigdor told The Associated Press he was not being paid for his work with Reade. His firm also denied there was a political motivation for his decision to represent Reade in her accusations against Trump’s Democratic opponent in the November election.
That’s not to say that Reade’s allegations shouldn’t be taken seriously. Reade’s claims must be investigated and, if proven true by hard-core evidence, Biden should be held accountable. Reade has said she verbally complained to three supervisors at the time about the alleged sexual harassment. All three have told CNN and other media outlets that they never received such a verbal complaint from Reade and were never aware of any sexual harassment complaints from anybody against Biden in the years that they worked with him.
For his part, Biden has unequivocally denied Reade’s allegations. “I know the truth of the matter. I know that this claim has no merit,” he said.
In April, Harris said in a San Francisco Chronicle podcast she believes that “Reade has a right to tell her story…I believe that, and I believe Joe Biden believes that, too,” Harris said. “The Joe Biden I know is somebody who really has fought for women and empowerment of women and for women’s equality and rights.”
Q: Many of President Trump’s supporters have called Joe Biden a bigot for the long list of comments, gaffes, speeches, and policies they find hurtful to Black Americans. How should Black Americans interpret your support for Joe Biden knowing all the things he has said and done?
This question is designed simply to call Biden a bigot and to discourage Black Americans from voting for Joe Biden. As to his policies which have indeed caused harm to Black Americans, led to mass incarceration and harsher sentences for people who use crack (generally Black people) than those who used powder cocaine (generally whites), and his opposition to federally mandated, not court mandated busing, we are clear-eyed that he did that.
Although Kamala Harris took Biden to task for his position on busing, she emphatically prefaced her comments about that with, “I know you’re not a racist.” Also, the support that Biden has gotten from Black professionals, legislators and the Black community, indicates that the community has forgiven him for his mistakes and believes he will be accessible and they will hold him accountable for the Black Agenda posted on his website.
Also, the fact that he chose Kamala Harris as his running mate and that his campaign staff reflects America’s diversity, makes it imperative for Black Americans to vote for Joe Biden.
Because we know this: With Kamala Harris as vice president, a diverse cabinet and, hopefully, a Democratic Senate majority, the reckoning for racial justice, equality and an end to systemic racism will be addressed.
This article originally published in the October 26, 2020 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
