Men of color– young and old– gathered on Thursday for a frank conversation on voter apathy and the power of the Black male vote as the presidential election heats up.
Are You Listening?, an all-male 2024 election panel discussion at Medgar Evers College, City University of New York, brought together young, voting-age students and local politicians. It was produced in part by MEC Male Development & Empowerment Center, the Brooklyn NAACP Youth Chapter, Office of Student Success and Office of Communications.
In attendance for the discussion, moderated by GRAMMY-nominated poet, activist and author Kevin Powell, was New York City Public Advocate Jumane Williams, Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso, and former Congressman Edolphus “Ed” Towns Jr.
The 93-year-old Towns gave a history lesson, recounting the story of how his grandfather’s voting rights were denied in North Carolina. After walking 15 miles to the nearest polling site, the elder Towns was given a rigged exam to test his worthiness of voting. The Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965 and Towns’ grandfather passed a few years later, never casting a vote in his country.
Audience members took turns posing questions to the speakers in the EOJ Auditorium, and the students’ prevailing consensus was that voting doesn’t count.
Williams talked about the Electoral College and how it helps select the president, calling it a holdover from slavery and mentioned the Three-Fifth Compromise, which said three out of every five slaves were counted when determining a state’s total population for legislative representation and taxation in 1787.
“You can’t end it on the vote, but they take the Black vote for granted,” Williams said.
Williams also cautioned the students about Project 2025, a political initiative organized by the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation that looks to restructure the executive branch with right-wing, conservative policy.
“It’s what these folks (planners) have wanted to do for a long time, it’s as destructive as you can get, but they’ve now found the vehicle in Donald Trump and the MAGA (Make America Great Again) movement to get that through,” Williams said. “Your vote is precious and a way to make a complaint.”
The meeting also had the full support of Antonio Reynoso, who spoke of his colorful collegiate experience at Syracuse University and how he came from poverty to become the current borough president.
“Black people have been the foundation of the Democratic Party for quite some time now. They vote at the highest clip of any demo in the U.S., so their interest is my interest,” Reynoso said.
High voter turnout is a must, he added.
“It doesn’t matter what party it is, we need high voting populations across the board, and we are seeing a disconnect with young people, and we want to reinvigorate them and explain to them the power that they have to change the outcomes that they see at the moment,” he added.
James Viafara, a student at Medgar Evers studying public administration, told BK Reader that he was concerned with follow-through from legislators.
“I believe that regulating our policy implementation is important, making sure that our legislators are following through, once they pass a bill at the state, local, and federal level we need to make sure there is a task force to assess compliance,” he said.
Viafara also said income equality across the country is too wide.
“There are a lot of people who are losing housing and employment opportunities and educational attainability,” he said, noting that the eligibility for the Tuition Assistance Program and other college grants need to be fixed.
Powell and the students promised to meet on a regular basis through next year’s mayoral race.