By Joe Garofoli | San Francisco Chronicle | Sep. 6,
2019
Corrin
Rankin of Redwood City heads the new Republican PAC that will recruit African
Americans.Photo: Courtesy Micah Grant
Redwood City resident Corrin
Rankin realizes the monumental task she’s undertaking: She just
started a political action committee devoted to recruiting more African
Americans to the California Republican Party.
Only 6% of likely
Republican voters in California are black, according to a new study by
the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California. But that signals only
part of the challenge Rankin faces as the president of the new Legacy Republican Alliance.
It’s not just that 3 out of 4 black voters nationally
disapprove of President Trump, according to a Fox News poll in July — another
survey, this one by Quinnipiac University, found that 80% think he
is racist.
Rankin insists that the Republican Party is “about more
than any one individual person.”
“The ‘racist’ term has been bandied by both sides in this
tense period of partisanship,” said Rankin, who was the California director for
African Americans for Trump in 2016. “The constant name-calling — we don’t want
to be a part of that. We are trying a different approach here, talking to
communities one step at a time. ... The black community is not a monolithic
community.”
A group awaits the start of White House reception in honor of National African American History Month on Feb. 21.Photo: Nicholas Kamm / AFP / Getty Images
Rankin unveiled her PAC this weekend at the California
Republican Party convention in Indian Wells near Palm Springs. The state party
has not given money to the organization. The PAC leaders declined to say how
much seed money they have raised thus far.
Rankin’s goal is first to elect black Republicans to
local, nonpartisan offices, when their party affiliation won’t be on the ballot
next to their names. There are no African American Republicans in the
Legislature or in the state’s congressional delegation, and no Republicans of
any color hold statewide office.
Legacy Republican Alliance’s leaders say they are
patterning the group in part on Grow Elect, which
has helped 230 Latino Republicans win election to local offices in the last
five years. But only one has won a partisan race — former Assemblyman
Dante Acosta, R-Santa Clarita (Los Angeles County). Acosta lost his bid for re-election
last year, so now there are no Latino Republicans in the Legislature.
“We will face the same obstacles,” said Micah Grant, a
vice president of Mercury Public Affairs in Sacramento and a member of the new
PAC’s board. “But we need to build a bench. It’s really hard to run straight
for Congress when nobody has ever heard of you.
“We know there are some other black conservatives who are
in hiding,” Grant said. “It can be really hard (to be a black conservative).
But here is a place they can come to.”
Grant hopes to find an audience with younger African
Americans, many of whom are registering to vote as nonpartisan. He said many
have an entrepreneurial streak that would mesh with conservative, free-market
beliefs.
“They’re saying, ‘We want to do what we want to do and we
don’t want the government to interfere.’ That’s a classic conservative
message,” Grant said. “We might not see the success of this in our lifetime,
but maybe our grandchildren will.”
Grant’s mantra: “We just have to show up. Everywhere.”
…
Joe Garofoli is The San Francisco Chronicle’s
senior political writer. Email: jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @joegarofoli
