Bush Has His Work Cut Out in Mending Ties With Blacks

George W. Bush was struggling last July to win a modicum of black support when he told delegates to the NAACP convention that, while his Republican Party was the party of Abraham Lincoln, it “has not always carried the mantle of Lincoln.”

But six months later, even the polite approval that greeted his effort that day in Baltimore has faded and his struggle continues. On Monday, he will deliver remarks to a Houston ceremony commemorating the birthday of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

And on Jan. 20 he enters the Oval Office tied with Ronald Reagan for the worst showing among black voters over the last 20 years--Bush won 9% of the black vote, as did Reagan in 1984--as well as simmering resentment, even hostility, among some African Americans. In fact, the first Inauguration Day protests in years over racial issues could be in prospect.

Political friends and opponents offer nearly universal concurrence that the president-elect has considerable fence-mending to do among African Americans and among the moderate white suburban voters or others who might shy from a politician tarnished by even a hint of racial insensitivity.

“The party has a problem,” said Ron Kaufman, a Republican strategist who has worked in various political capacities for the Bush family for more than two decades.

However, Kaufman and other Bush allies argued, the president-elect has been tainted with an unfair image, painted in broad, false strokes during a divisive presidential campaign.

Day after day, Vice President Al Gore reminded audiences at Democratic presidential rallies that Bush had spoken at Bob Jones University, which until recently banned interracial dating; that he balked at condemning the display of the Confederate battle flag over the South Carolina Capitol; and that he opposed a hate crime measure in Texas.

And, as the presidential election reached its controversial end in Florida, black voters who turned out in record numbers felt disenfranchised by ancient voting machines, hostile election officials--and the political muscle of Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, the president-elect’s brother.

But, said Kaufman, when it comes to race, “anyone who has known the president-elect and has understood his political career and personal career knows he has no problems” relating to African Americans.

The Most Diverse Cabinet in History

In assembling his Cabinet and White House staff, Bush nominated African Americans for some of the most important, visible positions: Retired Army Gen. Colin L. Powell as secretary of State; Condoleezza Rice as national security advisor; Rod Paige as Education secretary. Indeed, his Cabinet will be the most diverse in history.

Ari Fleischer, Bush’s spokesman, said that the president-elect would speak Monday about “the powerful and important role that Martin Luther King played in changing America” and would emphasize the importance of education.

Asked whether the bitterness in the black community concerning the conduct of the election, particularly in Florida, was a problem Bush had to address, Fleischer said: “I think the issue of unity in America is one of the key issues that he talked about throughout the campaign. Making racial progress in this country, regardless of who is in the White House or who is in the Congress, is an ongoing struggle, and he’s committed to it.”

But critics said that much more is needed. A few appointments and a few speeches are unlikely to convince African Americans that Bush really wants to embrace their concerns rather then fend them off as a political threat, they said.

The problem is deep and fundamental, said one senior Republican closely allied with the previous three GOP administrations.

“He doesn’t speak their language,” he said. “They’re looking at a rich white boy with entitlement--a Southern rich white boy.”

Julian Bond, chairman of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People, said that Bush’s effort to reach out to blacks “doesn’t go beyond photo ops.”

The Republicans “insult blacks with their rhetoric that we march in lock step to the polls,” he added.

Aide Will Work to Reach Black Voters

A senior Bush advisor, speaking on condition of anonymity, was optimistic that inroads are possible once Bush gains better control of the image-making machinery and can counter the portrait drawn of him in political advertising. And, he said, Bush plans to designate one aide who will specifically be charged with reaching out to blacks.

“One thing that can be fixed is the African American, union-charged-up intensity. We will get more than 8% or 9% of the African American vote [in a reelection drive] just by virtue of them seeing him, that he’s not scary,” the advisor said. “He got made to be scary and he’s not scary.”

But Phillip Klinkner, an associate professor of government whose research and teaching at Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y., focuses on race relations and U.S. politics, argued that “it’s not realistically possible [for Bush] to get more black votes.”

Indeed, the share of the black vote won by Republicans in recent national contests consistently hovers around 10%.

Then there is this question: Does it matter? Despite the overwhelming black support for Gore, it is Bush who is going to be inaugurated a week from today.

Political activists and observers said that it does matter, if considered just in terms of elections and ignoring the broader and terribly important question of uniting this country.

Bush must “avoid the perception among moderate whites that the Republicans are intolerant, or a racist party,” Klinkner said.

The Republican National Convention in Philadelphia last summer, run by Andrew H. Card Jr., whom Bush has named as his White House chief of staff, “was an attempt to look like a party open to African Americans and other nonwhite voters. But it didn’t play among African Americans who were looking for something more substantive,” Klinkner said.

“I don’t think Bush will do much to change the perception. What he will do is shore up his base among moderate whites.”

Among conservative white voters who do not want to appear to be racially intolerant, “moderate gestures seem to suffice. They don’t think it’s necessary to endorse the whole black agenda but merely to show a few gestures,” said Hastings Wyman, editor of the Southern Political Report, a biweekly newsletter that since 1978 has looked at political trends in the South.

Bush’s supporters point to his performance among African American voters in Texas’ 1998 gubernatorial race: He won 20% of the black vote by one estimate; 27% by another. But in the presidential race, that number in Texas is believed to have fallen to perhaps half of the less than 10% support he received nationally.

Bush fared better in November among other minority groups, winning 35% of the Latino vote and 41% of the Asian American vote.

National surveys of Bush’s popularity among black voters found a drop in his favorable/unfavorable rating of 43%/34% in May 1999, to one of 29% favorable, 55% unfavorable in late September. The polls were completed by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington research organization that specializes in African American issues.

“The more African Americans saw of him, the less they liked him,” said David Bositis, who conducted the studies.

“Are the Republicans worried about it? Yeah. Can they do something about it? Damned if I know,” Bositis said. “They’re not sure what to do.”

What about Bush speaking at a ceremony honoring King?

“That’s not something that’s going to have any effect. They have to do more than one thing, something that’s much more tangible,” Bositis said. “There’s a great deal of anger and a great deal of hostility toward Bush among African Americans.”

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Times staff writers Jack Nelson and Ronald Brownstein contributed to this story.