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| MINORITY OUTREACH | |
 August 2, 2000  |
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The Republicans attempt to include more minorities in their party. Kwame Holman reports.
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GOV. GEORGE W. BUSH: There's no escaping the reality that the party of Lincoln has not always carried the mantle of Lincoln. KWAME HOLMAN: It was at another convention three weeks ago, the annual meeting of the NAACP. In Baltimore, that George W. Bush admitted his Republican party had made mistakes in addressing the concerns of America's minorities. And minority concerns were the major theme of General Colin Powell's keynote address to the Republican convention Monday night. |
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| The party of Lincoln | ||||||||||||||||||||
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KWAME HOLMAN: A quick scan of the party's rank and file seated on the convention floor capsulizes the problem. The state delegations are overwhelmingly white. Nearly a dozen state delegations are completely white. In an Associated Press survey, only 4 percent of the Republican delegates here in Philadelphia described themselves as African Americans. RENEE AMOORE, New Majority Council, RNC: We understand that we need to reach out, okay, and really do a better job. And not just every four years because there's an election, but right after that next election we need to get out and go door to door. RENEE AMOORE: Hawaii. KWAME HOLMAN: Renee Amoore is the convention's assistant secretary, and presided over the opening roll call of states Monday evening. She's also deputy chairman of Pennsylvania's Republican party. But these days, Amoore's energies are focused more on the new majority council, an arm of the Republican National Committee created to encourage minority participation.
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| Republicans attracting 17% of the Black vote | ||||||||||||||||||||
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KWAME HOLMAN: More people who look like Renee Amoore followed her to the convention stage Monday evening as the Republican Party tried to present itself as the party of inclusion. But as the convention's deputy cochairman, Oklahoma's J.C. Watts, is on stage all week long. Watts is the only black Republican in the House of Representatives, and as a member of the House leadership, he refutes criticism that the Republican congressional agenda offers very little for minorities.
KWAME HOLMAN: Do you claim some credit for that? REP. J.C. WATTS: You bet. Yeah. The middle class has expanded over the last five and a half years since we've been in the majority. In the black community, the middle class has expanded. Home ownership is at its highest levels in the black community since we've been in control in Washington. I think black people understand as well. I don't think they want the government wasting their tax dollars. You know, black people pay taxes. And, you know, the government doesn't say, because you're black, you don't have to pay income taxes. KWAME HOLMAN: Of course, increased support among African Americans
translates into votes. One recent poll shows George W. Bush is attracting
only 17 percent of the black vote in America. His trouble attracting
Hispanic support is not as pronounced. He's popular in his home state
of Texas, and polls show Bush trailing Vice President Gore among Hispanics
by only 12 points nationwide. And in delegate-rich California, Hispanics
could decide who carries the state, and ultimately, who wins the election.
That's the message the 162- member California delegation, the largest
here in Philadelphia, heard repeatedly early Monday morning. REP. HENRY BONILLA, (R) Texas: There's a huge myth that exists out there among Democratic voters and those on the extreme left that somehow your political philosophy is based on the shade, the color of your skin, and somehow the darker your skin is that you're automatically predisposed in your mind to move to the left on the political spectrum. Nothing could be further from the truth. KWAME HOLMAN: Rod Pacheco is a state assemblyman from Riverside.
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| The Latino vote shaping the election? | ||||||||||||||||||||
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KWAME HOLMAN: Many political analysts have said California is in the Gore column. Do you contest that and will Latino voters be the difference?
REP. J.C. WATTS: It's in motion. It's moving forward. Does that mean we are going to get 30 percent of the black vote - 50 percent of the Hispanic vote in November? No, it doesn't, but it does show some movement, show some teeth being put into it. And I think Governor Bush gives an excellent opportunity to advance that effort pretty far down the field. KWAME HOLMAN: And so it surprised no one today that Governor Bush surrounded himself with Hispanic well-wishers shortly after his arrival in Philadelphia. |
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GEN.
COLIN POWELL: The party must follow the governor's lead in reaching
out to minority communities, and particularly the African American community,
and not just during an election year campaign.
RENEE
AMOORE: We have about 30 to 35 new majority councils on the state level.
That means each chairman we spoke to said we want to have this new majority
council, and then that filters to the rest of the folks in their state.
And so those folks get together to make sure that people of color are
elected in very important roles, whether it be state rep or school board,
those type of things. We want more people who look like me out there
representing us so that we can have a seat at the table. 
REP.
J.C. WATTS: You know, since we've been in the majority, unemployment
in the black community is down to its lowest levels ever in the history
of the country. The middle... 
They
filled the quaint but un- air-conditioned auditorium at Drexel University
for a preconvention pep talk, first from Arizona Senator John McCain.
followed by Texas Congressman Henry Bonilla. Bonilla has volunteered
to spread the party's minority outreach effort among Hispanics. 
RODERICK
PACHECO, California Delegate: You know, there are two parties in this
country, and Hispanics, African Americans have tended to gravitate towards
the Democratic Party, and we've made a mistake in doing that I think.
And the mistake is this: If we go to any one party, if we were all in
the Republican party for example, that party would take us for granted
like the Democrats do now. We need to be in all parties, and we need
to be in both parties. 
REP.
HENRY BONILLA: Well, right now Al Gore is ahead. There was a time a
few months ago when George W. Bush was ahead with the Latino voters,
and he's now generally within single digits of Gore in California. George
W. Bush is going to work hard in California. That state is not by any
means Al Gore's for his just to walk away with and he knows it. And
we feel very confident that if we have to make him use resources in
his own state that he's supposed to have, then that takes away efforts
that he's going to have in other swing states that swing out from the
Midwest all the way to New Jersey.