The Racial Divide In American Politics

With guest host John Harwood.

Midterms behind us. 2016 ahead. Racial voting disparity a major issue for both parties. Top strategists and politicians talk it though.

In last week’s mid-term elections, exit polls tell us, 60% of white voters backed Republican candidates for Congress. 75% of non-white voters backed Democrats. In the 2012 presidential race, the electorate was split the same way. Want to know who’s going to win the next one?  Figuring out the racial composition of the electorate is a good place to start. Is it healthy for American society that our politics divides this way? And what could reshuffle the deck?  This Hour, On Point: Is partisan competition now really about race?
– John Harwood

Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK), U.S. Representative for Oklahoma's Fourth District. (@TomColeOK04)

Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD), U.S. Representative for Maryland's Fourth District. (@repdonnaedwards)

Jamal Simmons, Democratic strategist, principal at the Raben Group and commentator for CBS News. (@JamalSimmons)

Kim Alfano, Republican strategist, owner of Alfano Communications. (@ALFANOCOMM)

NBC News: Deep Racial Divide Remains Under Obama -- "Blacks and whites still see a number of issues in dramatically different ways, most notably in policing. A recent survey by the Pew Research Center not only showed a vast gulf between black and white perceptions of the shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown and its aftermath, but even that blacks were paying much more attention to the news in Ferguson than whites."

The Atlantic: The Great Midterm Divide --  "But while the voting falloff between presidential-year and midterm elections has remained constant, its impact has been vastly magnified by a racial and generational realignment that has remade each party’s base of support since the 1980s. In presidential and congressional races alike, Democrats today fare best among minorities, Millennials, and white voters (especially women) who are single or college-educated. Even in a country rapidly growing more diverse, Republicans still rely almost entirely on whites, running best among those who are older, blue-collar, married, rural, and male. In other words, Democrats have become increasingly reliant on precisely the groups most likely to sit out midterms, while Republicans score best among those most likely to show up."

New York Times: The Democrats’ Southern Problem Reaches a New Depth -- "The inability of Southern Democrats to run well ahead of a deeply unpopular Mr. Obama raises questions about how an increasingly urban and culturally liberal national Democratic Party can compete in the staunchly conservative South. It raises serious doubts about whether a future Democratic presidential candidate, like Hillary Clinton, can count on faring better among Southern white voters than President Obama, as many political analysts have assumed she might."