Appearing as a panel member on Thursday's CNN New Day, when challenged with the fact that many cities where much of the black population live in poverty have been controlled by Democrats for many decades, liberal CNN political analyst Bakari Sellers tried to push blame onto "Southern legislatures" in "red states" -- all of which are currently Republican-controlled -- for black poverty.
After former Georgia GOP chairman Bruce Levell recalled that Milwaukee and other cities have been under a "Democrat regime" for over 60 years, host Chris Cuomo turned to Sellers and posed: "Mr. Levell swings a good stick at you, Bakari Sellers. A lot of these big cities have been Democratic-run through leadership for decades, and the status quo is unacceptable. Why continue to reward the party?"
Sellers complained of a "red herring" in Levell indicting Democrats and, ignoring the fact that even counties can be under the local control of Democrats, the liberal commentator tried to push blame to Republican-controlled legislatures:
Well, first of all, that's a red herring, and it's more complex than that, and I think Mr. Levell knows that as well. But if we want to just throw out statistics without understanding the complexity of issues of poverty, then we can talk about the fact that 95 out of the top 100 counties that are the most impoverished are in red states, and the highest concentration of impoverished African-Americans are in the Deep South under Southern legislatures.
Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Thursday, August 25, New Day on CNN:
7:10 a.m. ET
CHRIS CUOMO: And let me give you a chance to talk policy. What is Mr. Trump offering members of the African-American community across the spectrum? Because obviously you can't describe African-Americans as all living in the ghetto who will get shot when they walk down the street. So what is the range of policy proposals that he has?
BRUCE LEVELL, FORMER GEORGIA GOP CHAIRMAN: Well, I will tell you this, though. In terms of speeches, the bottom line is, Chris, that a lot of communities have been having a tough time that we've been seeing on TV that has a lot of situations going on with what we've seen in Milwaukee and a lot of other cities. You know, that's been under Democrat regime. And so, you know, the deal here is that, you know, you guys have had this 60 years plus, you know.
Give us a chance at this, give us a shot at this. In terms of Mr. Trump's, you know, charter school initiatives that go in a lot of African-American communities that could lift up a lot of these schools and get local control, bring in trade schools, electrical trade schools, skills, and a lot of those schools in there. You know, alternative solutions that will really impact and help the African-American community.
CUOMO: Mr. Levell swings a good stick at you, Bakari Sellers. A lot of these big cities have been Democratic run through leadership for decades, and the status quo is unacceptable. Why continue to reward the party?
BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, first of all, that's a red herring, and it's more complex than that, and I think Mr. Levell knows that as well. But if we want to just throw out statistics without understanding the complexity of issues of poverty, then we can talk about the fact that 95 out of the top 100 counties that are the most impoverished are in red states, and the highest concentration of impoverished African-Americans are in the Deep South under Southern legislatures.
But the point is, you ask for a concrete proposal. One of the things that Hillary Clinton is talking about is taking 10 percent of the federal government spending and investing that in the communities that have 20 percent poverty for over 30 years. It's called the 10-20-30 plan from Congressman James Clyburn. She's talking about implementing that. And that uplifts 434 communities -- Democrat and Republican -- but many of which are communities of color. That's a concrete plan. I am really, really tired of Donald Trump and his surrogates unable to articulate to you a plan on which they're going to have to how [sic] to do anything. And that's the frustrating thing about this political debate.
