Former NAACP President Ben Jealous Says ‘Right Wing Targets Black Men’ For Voter Suppression

Former NAACP President Ben Jealous said that the “right-wing targets Black men” for voter suppression while on MSNBC with Craig Melvin. 

Melvin introduced his guest by noting that 89 percent of Black Americans voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 — pointing out that the demographic could be a deciding factor this Election Day.

“Black voters are engaged at record-breaking levels, and the push to increase turnout, that push is intensifying,” Melvin added. “With that push, there are also signs of efforts to keep Black voters from actually casting their ballots.”

Jealous joined the MSNBC anchor to discuss the topic, claiming that Black voters could push the results in almost every battleground state.

“The right wing has shown again and again that you can go after Black male sporadic voters, Black men unlikely voters, and there are simply more Black men who are unlikely voters than Black women and quite frankly, confuse them, discourage them, even get a small but not insignificant number of them to switch and vote for the Republican,” Jealous said when asked why he views Black men as top targets of the Republican Party.

“So they’ve just found it’s fertile ground for mischief year after year after year,” he added. “And as things have become increasingly digital, you’ve even seen foreign state actors go after Black men too.”

Jealous later explained how he has been combatting the issue, laying out how he’s raised awareness and encouraged Black men to vote and engage politically.

“In 23 states we’ve contacted 2.5 million Black men, it’s roughly 90 percent of the Black men for whom we have a cell phone number that we know to be both registered to vote but sporadic in when they vote. 90 percent of them have opened up their texts and almost 10 percent of them have been in conversation with us,” he explained. “Well over 200,000 have been in conversation with us about how to vote — not which candidate, but literally how to vote this year especially, when to vote, where to vote.”

Watch above, via MSNBC.