Charlie Gerow, the CEO of Quantum Communications in Pennsylvania, is predicting that Vice President Kamala Harris will have a “short fall” among Black and Latino voters in the Key Stone state.
Gerow, who joined POLITICO’s “Playbook Deep Dive” podcast with Philadelphia city councilor Isaiah Thomas, said the Republicans have the advantage with the on-the-ground centers they have set up to reach Latino voters.
AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast
“The short fall for Kamala Harris among African Americans is very significant and as a Latino,” Gerow said. “I can tell you that the centers that the republicans have set up to attract Latino support are working marvelously.”
Gerow’s comments come just days after former President Donald Trump suggested that ‘any African American or Hispanic” who does not vote for him needs to get their “head examined.” Both campaigns have seemingly been focusing on Black and Latino demographics, by holding rallies and events specifically geared toward the demographics.
Black Voters
Thomas countered Gerow’s point by noting that the Black male voters he has talked to will not say they are voting for Trump, but they are suggesting they might not vote in general.
A poll released by the NAACP showed 63 percent of Black voters favor Harris over Trump’s 13 percent. However, the gender disparity is noticeable. While support for Harris among Black women remains strong at 67 percent, it falls to 49 percent among Black men under 50.
Among early voters in swing states, a poll conducted by Harvard University, HarrisX, and The Harris Poll between October 11 and 13, found Harris led among female voters, Black and Latino voters as well as with urban and suburban voters.
Harris told the National Association of Black Journalists that it’s important to not work from the assumption that “Black men are in anyone’s pocket.”
She released policy proposals this week geared toward Black men, ranging from fully forgiving loans of up to $20,000 for Black business owners to focusing on Black men’s health outcomes.
Harris joined NBA players CJ McCollum and Chris Paul on PlayersTV Thursday, and pointed out that the environment has “been this way for a while,” of “sending signals to people that they don’t count or that if they put themselves out there it will not make a difference.”
“People must have the power, and representation matters,” Harris said. “It is part of the founding ideals of our country, the promise of equality, the promise of freedom, the promise of liberty for all. We know we have a whole lot of work to do in that regard, especially when we look at the condition of Black men in America.”
AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, File
She also mentioned her own and President Joe Biden‘s work to increase federal contracts to minority owned businesses, deal with marijuana offenses, reduce the infant mortality rate, as well as provide money to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs).
Harris said this work is able to continue, if people vote and hold politicians accountable.
“We cannot be silenced,” Harris said. “There is too much hard work that has happened by those who came before use for us to fall pray to cynicism, especially by people who are intentionally trying to convince us that we don’t matter.”
Latino voters
Trump said at his Atlanta rally on Tuesday that the “African American community and the Hispanic community are being devastated with jobs.” He claimed undocumented immigrants are taking their jobs.
The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the country’s oldest and largest Latino civil rights organization, has endorsed Harris, the first time in the group’s nearly 100-year history that it has thrown its formal backing behind a a presidential candidate.
In Nevada, Latinos represent about 22 percent of the electorate. In Arizona, nearly one in four voters is Latino. There’s a growing population of Latinos in Georgia, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, that LULAC’s PAC chair told Newsweek could be enough to deliver those must-win states to the Democrats.
Latino voters are projected to account for almost 15 percent of all eligible voters this year, according to the Pew Research Center.
Carlos Delgado/AP Images for Univision
BSP Research conducted a poll of Latino voters from October 2 to 10, surveying 1,900 people in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. The poll found that 64 percent of Latino voters in battleground states have been contacted by a political party or campaign. A majority of Latino voters surveyed supported more progressive policies, and 60 percent said they became more interested in the election after Harris became the nominee.
The registration gap
While the Trump campaign has about half as many offices as the Harris campaign set up in Pennsylvania, Gerow pointed out that the “registration gap between Democrats and Republicans has absolutely collapsed in Pennsylvania over the course of the past few years, and particularly in 2024.”
Gerow predicts areas like “the T,” which is the more rural area of the state, as well as the northern tier and western part will help Trump win over Pennsylvania. The Republican suggested Trump will win Pennsylvania by two-points, “which in the grand-scheme of things is a landslide.”
Thomas, however, believes south-eastern Pennsylvania is “a big part to Harris’ path to victory.” He also listed Allegheny County, suggesting that “Montgomery County and other counties will follow suit.” Thomas calls for a three-point win for Harris as his “soft guess.”
On Thursday, 338Canada published its latest update, which put Harris slightly ahead of Trump in Michigan and Pennsylvania. In Pennsylvania, the model gave Harris a 52 percent chance of victory, against 48 percent for Trump.
RealClearPolitics’ polling tracker shows on Friday that, with no toss-up states, Trump is set to claim all seven swing states. Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania flipped in favor of Trump in the past two weeks, with the former president 0.5 points ahead in Nevada and Pennsylvania and 0.9 points ahead in Michigan, per the tracker.
FiveThirtyEight’s polling average on October 18 showed what the site called an “even race,” with Harris leading by only 0.2 points, with 47.9 percent of the vote and Trump receiving 47.7 percent. Nationally, the average polling site showed that Harris was ahead Friday by 2.1 points, receiving 48.4 percent of the vote to Trump’s 46.3 percent.
