Thousands of Black men joined a virtual conference Monday night to fundraise for Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, according to the event’s organizers. The massive turnout helped dispel toxic myths about Black men’s willingness to back a woman candidate.
The event was hosted by “Win With Black Men,” a collective of organizers modeled after “Win With Black Women,” the activist group that held its own, massive Zoom call to fundraise for Harris on Sunday.
Journalist Roland Martin; activists Michael Blake, Khalil Thompson and Quentin James; and political commentator Bakari Sellers hosted the men’s conference. Sellers gave a passionate endorsement of Harris while explaining how she was one of the first people to call him when his baby daughter was very ill.
In various corners of social media, there’s been speculation — fueled by social media chatter and, in part, by conservatives who are hardly authorities on Black voters — that Black men will largely be averse to voting for Harris because she’s a Black woman. Similarly offensive suggestions were made about Black men in Georgia’s 2022 gubernatorial election when Stacey Abrams was on the ballot in a rematch against Republican incumbent Brian Kemp, but those speculations never came to fruition.
And Monday was a powerful show of Black men’s broad support for the Harris campaign. A “Win With Black Men” organizer reported more than 53,000 Black men joined the virtual event on Monday and raised $1.3 million in four hours. The organizers say half of that will go to the Harris campaign, and half will go to organizations that specialize in mobilizing Black men to vote. MSNBC hasn’t independently verified the fundraising numbers. The Harris campaign did not immediately return a request for comment.
The energy surrounding the event was palpable enough to inspire organizers to commit to similar, pro-Harris conferences geared toward other demos — like white women.
There was an array of speakers at this virtual conference, including actors Don Cheadle and Bill Bellamy; comedian Bill Bellamy; Democratic lawmakers Raphael Warnock, the senator from Georgia, and Maxwell Frost, the congressman from Florida; faith leaders Bishop William Barber, Pastor Jamal Bryant, and the Rev. Mark Thompson; Mayors Brandon Scott of Baltimore and Brandon Johnson of Chicago; as well as labor leaders and community organizers.
But the message was essentially the same from all of the speakers: They may be men, but they aren’t MAGA men who want to be conscripted into Donald Trump’s hypermasculine crusades. Speakers took turns bigging up Harris’ leadership qualities, dispelling myths about Harris’ prosecutorial record in California, encouraging Black men voters to reject racist and sexist attacks on Harris, and calling on viewers of the conference to reach out to other Black men who may feel disaffected by the political system and may be considering not voting.
For all the breathless the media and online about Black men allegedly swinging in Trump’s favor this election cycle, Monday’s meetup underscored the political reality: There are many Black men — like there are many Black women — firmly in Harris’ corner. And they’re putting their money where their mouth is, adding what’s already been a massive fundraising haul for Harris in the first few days of her campaign.
You can check out a full video with all of the “Win With Black Men” speakers here:
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.