GOP Looks to HBCUs

By Titus Ledbetter III
Black College Wire

Photo credit: Republican National Committee President Bush touts "No Child Left Behind" -- a Republican talking point to woo African Americans -- as he speaks with fourth graders in St. Louis.

While support for the Republican Party has risen among older African Americans, the party quietly has been taking steps to spread its message to students at historically black colleges and universities.

"Now you are starting to see student Republican groups at Howard and Central State. We have a long way to go, but the message is getting through," said Tara Wall, press secretary for outreach for the Republican National Committee and the College Republican National Committee. "Many feel the Democrats are taking their vote for granted."

In a national opinion poll published Oct. 19 by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, 15 percent of African Americans ages 51 to 64 identified themselves as Republicans, compared with 5 percent who did so in 2002. Among those 18 to 25, 5 percent identified themselves as GOP.

Black membership in the party may be small, but polls predict a tight finish in the national election Nov. 2, so every vote will count. Regardless of the outcome, Republicans seem to be laying groundwork for future elections.

Membership in the College Republican National Committee has tripled since 2000. Established in 1892, and with 120,000 members on 1,148 campuses, the committee claims to be oldest and largest grass-roots political organization on U.S. college campuses.

The efforts of the Republican Party to influence young people have generally slipped under the radar as nonpartisan organizations, such as hip-hop icon Sean "P. Diddy" Combs' Citizen Change, which encourages young people to "Vote or Die," grabbed the headlines.

During the Bush administration, College Republican chapters have popped up on several HBCU campuses. The groups' national leaders aim to start more. The College Republican National Committee includes among its missions minority and women's outreach. Wall said 9,000 Republican team members were letting people know how the party is "empowering" people of color. These team members can already be found on the Howard and Central State campuses, she said.

Central State, in Wilberforce, Ohio, is developing its group this year. Monique Cherry, president of the Central State student government association, said the group is small and is choosing an adviser. While the group is not yet recognized as a campus organization, members participate in the political forums held on campus.

"All students need to be represented in their political party affiliations," Cherry said. "Contrary to popular belief, HBCUs are not only breeding Democrats." She said she was sure the group was well on its way to becoming a "respected" force on campus.

Southern University's College Republicans plan this year to invite business speakers from across the nation to motivate students, its officers told the campus newspaper, The Southern Digest. The group, started in 2002, also helped push voter registration on campus, the Southern Digest reported.

Howard University's College Republicans chapter was re-chartered in 2002.

Wall, who is African American, said she was confident that students attending HBCUs were slowly opening their eyes to steps the Republicans have taken to improve African Americans' lives.

Still, in the recent poll by the Joint Center, Democrat John Kerry beat President Bush among African American voters. Those surveyed overwhelmingly disapproved of Bush's handling of Iraq. Sixty-seven percent gave him an "unfavorable" job performance rating.

But 18 percent of African Americans surveyed said they were willing to vote for Bush. By comparison, when polled in 2000, 9 percent said they would support him, according to the Center. The survey was conducted from Sept. 15 to Oct. 10 and included interviews with 1,642 adults, including 850 African Americans.

"African Americans should vote for the candidate who best represents the values they hold dear: education, economic empowerment and faith, rather than follow a political party that for too long has taken them for granted," Sharon Castillo, a spokeswoman for Bush/Cheney '04, said via e-mail.

"The president has reached out to African American pastors who share his commitment to protecting the sanctity of marriage and life at all stages," she said. "But the most important thing the president has done is implement policies that have a positive impact on the lives of all African Americans."

Often cited among these policies is Bush's support for the historically black colleges.

In February, the president's appointed board of advisers for HBCUs commended him for backing the colleges and for appointing HBCU graduates to prominent positions in his administration. According to Republican Party spokesmen, Bush's fiscal 2005 budget will increase funding for HBCUs by $240.5 million. The budget also increases funding for historically black graduate institutions by $58.5 million.

One controversial initiative is Bush's "No Child Left Behind." The act aims to raise standards by forcing students to pass new tests before graduating from key elementary school grades.

Many African Americans say the only way to address the high dropout rate in inner-city schools is to place more emphasis on the counselors, not on tests. They say the tests might encourage administrators to tolerate high dropout rates.

Sixty-seven percent of African Americans gave "No Child Left Behind" fair/poor grades in the Joint Center's poll.

Responding to the Joint Center survey, Kerry wrote that the program had not received proper funding and that he was concerned about the dropout rate. He also said schools needed to take responsibility for their graduation rates so that they did not "artificially inflate" test averages by letting low-income students drop out.

Wall, the Republican spokeswoman, gave a different view of No Child Left Behind.

"This is our new civil rights issue: We need to educate our children," she said. "The president is putting his money where his mouth is. It is racist to pass students to the next grade without testing them."

The Republican Party also has been quick to tout Small Business Administration programs that provide women and minorities resources to start new businesses, and homeownership help. More than 24 companies have pledged in excess of $1.1 trillion in mortgage assistance for minority homeowners for this decade, said the Bush campaign. Bush has said that his goal is to increase minority homeownership by 5.5 million families before the year 2010.

"Despite the negative lies spread about Republicans, there is a lot blacks can take advantage of through small business ownership and the expansion in minority homeownership," said Wall. "The Democrats' worst fear is that people find out the truth about the Republican Party."

Titus Ledbetter III is a student at Hampton University.

Posted Oct. 28, 2004