Has the Democratic Party Agreed to Stop Talking About Race?

A messaging memo obtained by ContrabandCamp reveals the party’s plan to “deprioritize” fighting the Trump administration’s attack on civil rights.

Screenshot via YouTube

Sometimes when I’m sad, I open my computer to find a photo of Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) wearing a kente cloth stole, kneeling with her fellow Democrats inside the Capitol.

For 8 minutes and 46 seconds in 2020, the kente cloth-draped Democratic congressional delegation knelt to symbolize how long white Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on George Floyd’s neck. No humor was intended in the gesture, which makes it even funnier. Apparently, the collective brain trust of elected officials – those tasked with saving America from orange Thanos — really believed that a moment of silence was an effective countermeasure to the most divisive presidency in recent times. It’s the kind of photo that is so insanely stupid that it should have been taken at a mall. It’s brilliant in its hilarity because the people in the photo genuinely believed in the power of the image they were creating. They believed in the performative gesture of protest.

Make no mistake, the protest was merely performative. They didn’t take to the streets to stop traffic or chain themselves to the Supreme Court doors. No, they walked down to the Capitol’s visitor center and kneeled, which was the football equivalent of NFL albatross and actual real-life protester Colin Kaepernick kneeling in the San Francisco 49ers locker room rather than on the field. The sentiment was as real as the (probably) Chinese-made kente cloth the Dems donned in protest.

And just like that, it was over.

Then Trump got elected again and armed his South African lackey, Elon Musk, (whom Bloomberg dubbed “the first friend”) with a chainsaw to gut the federal government, and everyone was warned that diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs — programs created to ensure that institutions didn’t look like the current, mostly white administration — were getting cut first and fast.

Trump and Elon were bringing whiteness back *Justin Timberlake voice* by claiming that DEI was preferential treatment to people of color and was hurtful to white, straight men. On the president’s first day in office, he began signing executive orders to demand federal agencies end all diversity programs. They even made sure no federal institution was using deceitful and divisive language like “Black” and “accessible.” (Seriously, here’s a long list of words that are no longer allowed under the current administration, according to the New York Times) Then, during his Trump rally disguised as a Joint Session of Congress, the president boasted that DEI was no more.

"We have ended the tyranny of so-called diversity, equity and inclusion policies all across the entire federal government and, indeed, the private sector and our military," Trump said. "And our country will be woke no longer."

And the white side of the room — literally the entire Republican side of the room during Trump’s “Watch me break my arm patting myself on the back” speech — rose in applause. And there were the Democrats, the sad, sad Democrats waving their Fogo De Chao meat paddles with words like “Musk Steals” and “Save Medicaid.” Another hollow gesture from a band of thieves, masquerading as marauders … because — come close to me when I say this — they’re in on it, too.

I know. I know.

I didn’t want to think so either until ContraBandCamp acquired a messaging memo essentially telling the Democratic Party to stop caring about Black people.

Reportedly commissioned by the Democratic National Committee, the guidance from polling firm Blue Rose Research used survey data to recommend strategies “on what fights to amplify – and which ones to deprioritize.” The “most effective pushback” was essentially a list of things white people care about, including tax cuts for the wealthy, tariffs and cuts to Social Security and Medicare. The memo also noted that pushing back against the MAGA administration’s draconian immigration policies and “federal cuts that don’t directly impact Americans” were “less effective.”

“Unfortunately, messaging that highlights the Trump Administration’s rollbacks of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies scores in the 25th percentile of Trump messaging tested by Blue Rose Research,” the document stated. “[w]e typically only recommend highlighting messaging that falls in at least the 50th percentile or above.”

According to Pew Research, 44% of the Democratic voters are non-white. Using the logic of the Democratic Party’s paid advisers, the party shouldn’t fight any issue that affects Black, Hispanic or non-white voters unless white people co-sign its importance. And while many Democrats possibly ignored the suggestion (I mean, maybe they wrote something about it on the back of their shirts, and we just couldn’t see it), the “messenger” they chose to give their response to Trump’s “joint session yeehaw remix” was pretty telling.

Unlike Trump, who delivered his entire speech at a dog-whistle pitch to please the ears of his MAGA base, the Democratic Party didn’t select someone who represents the party’s most loyal constituency. Instead, they chose a white woman. Not only is Elissa Slotkin one the most right-leaning members of the caucus, but she also voted against a bill to reform Washington, D.C.’s draconian criminal justice system and thinks “identity politics needs to go the way of the dodo.” During a time when Black, Hispanic and LGBTQIA Americans are under attack, Slotkin stuck to the white script. Her speech didn’t contain a single mention of “civil rights,” “diversity,” “equity,” “inclusion,” “transgender,” “mass deportation,” or even the word “equal.”

This was a message, too.

Imagine being a Black woman who serves as the backbone of a political party whose official position is to say nothing about the issues that affect you the most. The Democratic Party’s tendency to chase moderate white voters at the expense of its most loyal demographic is one of Black voters’ most common intraparty criticisms. Contrary to the whitesplained narrative concocted by James Carville, Democratic scammers strategists and the lipless finger waggers at Pod Save White America, appealing to progressive voters of color is the Democratic Party’s only path to success. While it’s easy to blame the party’s losses on the “woke era,” it’s also easy to forget that Carville’s last successful presidential campaign predates the internet era, when three out of four Democratic voters were white.

To be fair, the Caucasian know-it-alls are not totally wrong. The data clearly shows that white heebie-jeebies prevent most racial issues from crossing the threshold needed for Democrats to care. According to Pew Research, “focusing on increasing diversity, equity and inclusion” falls below the 50th percentile — but only among white people. Police reform does not reach the 50% approval rating because white people do not support it. Most whites (and Asians) support increasing efforts to deport people living in the U.S. illegally. Still, a strategy that prioritizes white sensibilities over Black lives sends a clear message.

Democrats don’t care about Black people.

The memo also highlighted the Democratic Party’s failure to challenge the GOP’s messaging. The white nationalist propaganda that demonized DEI came from the same playbook that redefined critical race theory and demonized progressives for supporting “open borders.” But, for some reason, the Democratic Party has agreed to adopt Trump's definition of DEI and his right-wing, white supremacist position. They are allowing him to use “DEI” as a catchall to dismantle equal rights and reboot America in the image of his authoritarian, pro-white tech broligarchy.

Yet, none of the Democrats who received these talking points publicly pushed back on them. Because, according to the Democratic Party’s official communication, “effective pushback” is a privilege exclusively reserved for white Democrats. Black people get T-shirts and carefully coded words of caucasity.

A stunt is not a protest.

Protests affect change. The citizens who marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge were not performing; they were headed to “petition the governor for changes in the social order.” The first sit-ins forced businesses to stop being racist. The March on Washington was “more than just a demonstration,” it was “a living petition.”

“Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue,” wrote one activist who didn’t depend on church fans to spread his message. “The purpose of our direct action program is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation.”

Then again, I must confess that I have been gravely disappointed with the Democratic Party. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that Black people’s great stumbling block in their stride toward freedom was not Donald Trump or the white nationalist MAGA movement but supporting the white moderate party that is more devoted to “decorum” than to justice.

I’m sure that sentiment would not fall in the realm of “effective messaging.”

But who knows? Maybe Democrats are quietly planning a revolutionary act of civil disobedience. Maybe they’ll stage a sit-in from their well-cushioned office chairs while they wait for the “I don’t see color” auction paddles to come back from the printers. They could be waiting for their white members to select a negro spiritual to sing while holding up a Black fist in their custom-made Temu dashikis. (I vote for “We Shall Overcome”).

Oh, wait … they already did that one.

Unfortunately, “overcoming” scores in the 25th percentile of messaging tested by Y.P. Pull Polling Firm.

Too bad there isn’t a tariff on kente cloth.