The Sisters Under the DNC Bus: Black Democratic Women Leaders Continue(d) to Ride the Back of the Bus in 2024 and Beyond

Thanks to chloris creator, for her insightful article on the DNC 2024 presidential campaign autopsy. I believe, however, that another major reason that the Democratic Party lost the 2024 presidential election is that VP Kamala Harris was handed the impossible mission of executing a successful presidential campaign in just over 3 months without the benefit of a primary round that would have given primary voters more opportunities to check her out in her own (non-VP) right—and avoid the corporate (white-dominated) legacy media’s virtual whiteout of her campaign. President Joe Biden and the Dem party establishment bear primary responsibility for his failure to follow through on his 2020 campaign promise not to seek a second term.

More important is what I have pointed out in previous posts as the Democratic Party/white progressive black woman—actually white patriarchy—problem. This is the culturally ingrained double standard that demands that black women politicians work twice as hard as their white male counterparts to be considered half as good. This is not just a matter of “identity politics,” not when the Party of tRump and the Roberts Jim Crow 2 SCOTUS are attempting to reinstall racial apartheid as the law of the land under the guise of “color blindness.” The Democratic Party’s racialized political obtuseness may result in TX Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico losing that key race to GOP racist political slimeball Ken Paxton this coming November. This unwanted outcome is possible, maybe even likely, due to Black TX voter anger at the Dem support of a white male state rep with no national experience over TX Representative Jasmine Crockett, a sitting US representative with years of national legislative experience. This sort of demographic self-own in a tight US Senate race in a major swing state like TX is a political shot in the foot that the Democratic Party can’t afford in 2026 and beyond.

My point is this: The racist “angry black woman” stereotype is way past its expiration date. I find it fascinating that white male congressional Dems can be praised by Dems and other progressives for eloquent and fiery public speeches in support of American democracy, while Black women congressional reps are ignored or slapped with the demeaning “angry black woman” slur for doing likewise. At a time when a globalized theofascist political movement threatens democracy here and abroad, we who aspire to be effective builders of a 21st-century multi-racial, multicultural democracy must start by confronting our own racial demons. Otherwise, we and the Democratic Party will continue to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory this coming November and beyond.

Let’s resolve to clean up our collective act as advocates for real democracy in America. Aluta Continua!

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