The black moderate tries to explain Gov. Rick Perry's new-found interest in the black community.
He writes: "The former Texas governor looks to be cutting himself out of the conservative herd. He recently blasted his fellow Republicans for losing “our moral legitimacy as the party of Lincoln, as the party of equal opportunity,” by being “content to lose the black vote.
Perry’s strategy seems incongruous for a man who was embarrassed during the 2012 primaries by the revelation that his family hunting lodge had a racial epithet over the entrance: “N-ggerhead Ranch.” He also remains a champion of voter identification laws, which disproportionately push blacks, Latinos and the young out of the voting booth.
Now, as he runs for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination, Perry claims he is looking to help black people. “We’re a country with Hispanic CEOs, with Asian billionaires, with a black President,” he said in a speech earlier this month. “So why is it, today, so many black families feel left behind? Why is it that a quarter of African-Americans live below the poverty line [even with] food stamps and housing subsidies?"