By Mark Rhoads –
On Nov. 6 national Democrats had high hopes for two stars to be elected. The first was Andrew Gillum who would have been the first black governor of Florida and the second was Stacey Abrams who aspired to become the first black female governor of any state. Gillum lost by 33,000 votes to Republican Rick DeSantis but took back his election night concession to pin his hopes on a recount that still showed DeSantis as the winner. Then Gillum conceded a second time last Saturday night when it was clear he still could not win.
Stacy Abrams lost by 55,000 votes to her GOP opponent Brian Kemp and also failed by 17,000 votes to force a runoff election under Georgia law. Abrams filed lawsuits to alter the count and untimately acknowledged that Kemp would be certified. But she still claimed she was not conceding because of her assertion that Kemp in his capacity as Secretary of Stte was responsible for voter suppression. But her lawyers could not offer any proof that her supporters were denied any legitimate right to vote.
Naturally, Democrats and their media allies claim that people who did not vote for Gillum or Abrams could only have been motivated by ugly racial bias by white voters against them. This false claim has to be rejected by fair people. Of course no one can guarantee that no voter ever rejected Gillum or Abrams because of racial bigotry. But to make the argument that bigotry could be the only factor in their defeat is a slander against all people who voted in the majority. Surely thousands of voters simply believed that Gillum and Abrams were too far left in their views to be good governors for their respective states.
Democrats in 2018 like to ignore history and just forget that the first black congressman elected in the north in the 20th Century was Republican Oscar DePriest from Illinois in 1928 and the first black U.S. Senator in the north was Republican Edward Brooke from Massachusetts who was elected in 1966. in 2016 Republican Sen.Tim Scott was the first African-American elected from any southern state since the post-Civil War Reconstruction period in 1881.
Two Democrats also serve in the Senate, Corey Booker of New Jersey and Kamala Harris of California but left-leaning media like to imply that Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina is a token or "not black enough" just because he is a conservative Republican who undermines their favorite narrative that all Republicans bear the guilt of racial bias.
The truth is that viewing every single election where a black Democrat might lose and claiming that "democracy failed" as Abrams does is a blatant reverse form of racism that is not worthy of the majority of African-American civic leaders.
