(NewsNation) — Vice President Kamala Harris heads to Detroit on Tuesday as she looks to shore up support from Black voters.
Harris will host a town hall with Charlamagne tha God on Tuesday night after making local stops with Black entrepreneurs in Detroit.
The vice president has been underperforming compared to President Joe Biden’s support with Black men, and her campaign is working hard to win them back.
Michigan has become much more of a purple state in recent years after decades as a lynchpin for the Democrats’ so-called “blue wall” of Midwestern states. Harris hopes Michigan will help cement her victory in the 2024 election next month.
Recent polling shows Harris’ support among Black men has been at its lowest point for any Democratic candidate for president since 2008.
To that end, Harris rolled out a series of initiatives Monday aimed at winning back Black male voters, including:
- Legalizing recreational marijuana.
- Loans that are fully forgivable up to $20,000 for Black entrepreneurs looking to start businesses.
- Boosting investment and creating new career pathways for Black men in education.
- Launching what the campaign calls a “National Health Equity Initiative” targeted at Black men who disproportionately suffer from sickle cell anemia, diabetes, mental health and prostate cancer.
The rollout comes just days after former President Barack Obama made a blunt appeal to Black voters in Pittsburgh, at times criticizing them for coming up with excuses not to vote for Harris because she’s a woman.
Harris stayed focused on her populist messaging Monday night in Pennsylvania at a campaign rally in Erie.
“We are focused on issues that matter most to families across America like bringing down the cost of living, investing in small businesses and entrepreneurs, protecting reproductive freedom and keeping our nation secure, but that is not what we hear from Donald Trump; instead, it is just the same old, tired playbook,” Harris said.
While Harris holds a significant lead with Black voters overall, a recent AP/NORC poll found Black men are nearly twice as likely as Black women to say Trump would make a good president.