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Cory Booker has suspended his campaign for president, and it's sad that GOP trolls are calling out Black people for not supporting their own. And what’s most distressing here is, I agree. Why didn’t Booker connect to African American voters, nationally or in Iowa?
I joined Cory Booker’s campaign remotely this year because I’m an old school fan. Booker was Newark’s mayor and the center of a 2009 Peabody Award-winning Sundance documentary, Brick City. I was a stay-at-home mom then and watched the film at home in Arkansas, where I developed a healthy appetite for reality television and the people brave enough to star in it.
I followed Booker on Twitter after viewing the movie. I was in awe when he tweeted to a stranded resident that he and his crew were on the way to deliver diapers during a blizzard. Cory didn’t have kids, and he really didn’t have to be on Twitter volunteering to bring diapers to anyone — but he did. That’s the strongest memory I have of Booker as a politician. It’s also among the many reasons I had for supporting his bid for the 2020 presidency.
Before Brick City, Booker was the center of another documentary, Street Fight. In it, he waged a campaign against political corruption and a popular career mayor; despite it all, he lost. When Booker became mayor something similar happened in Newark that happened in Washington, DC, over the past couple of years. Corrupt people in positions of incredible influence and power landed in jail.
Critics and columnists have attributed Booker’s inability to connect with voters to dad jokes and his quirky sense of humor. The last time Booker was on the debate stage, he wondered if Joe Biden was high when he suggested federal marijuana legalization wasn’t needed. In a debate prior to that, Joe Biden referred to Cory Booker as the next president and in that moment, all was right in the world.
In my eyes, Booker’s inability to connect with voters is quite similar to the reasons that people in rural areas connect so well with Donald Trump. Trump’s a television celebrity who’s had a life relatively free of financial struggle. Booker is the guy next door who’s gone ahead to lead a successful and wholesome life. And maybe — just maybe — he’s too squeaky clean for the masses.
Arkansas is filled with conservative republicans, just like the U.S. Senate. From where I’m sitting, the nation needs Booker to end the hateful partisanship in Congress. As president, Bernie promises to end economic inequity, and Warren promises something similar. If there’s any one thing that totally differentiates one democratic presidential candidate from the other it’s electability. I live in a red state, and I believe Cory was the more electable of any Democratic candidate vying for the nomination because he, over the others, was more likely to appeal to the national pool of independent voters, a voting pool that outnumbers both the GOP and Democratic voting bloc. It's also the same voting bloc that pushed President Obama into office his first term.
When I think about the intelligence, patience, grace and resolve that’s needed to explain why we march, why we protest and why we wear shirts that say Black Lives Matter, I believe Cory was the candidate who could've explained our story across the aisle and find not just GOP empathy, but resolution. New Jersey is lucky they still have Cory Booker as their Senator, but that only does so much for the rest of us in the Deep South red states who aren’t about to sacrifice warm weather for a blue state or its winter weather of regular freezing temps and snow.
