As the dust settles on the 2024 election results, there’s been plenty of talk about traditionally left-leaning voters who swung right, helping re-elect former President Donald Trump. But there are some groups where Vice President Kamala Harris dominated Trump — in particular amongst Black women, who supported Harris by a margin of 78%.
Black women, however, make up only 6% of the electorate. And in the aftermath of Harris’ loss, many of them are speaking out, expressing frustration with the Democratic party, the left in general, and in particular, with women who supported Donald Trump.
Adiba Nelson, a writer, speaker and activist, counts herself among the group of Black women who are outraged by the election results. Nelson joined The Show to talk about, among other things, she feels betrayed by white women who didn’t consider the needs of her community when they cast their ballots.
Full conversation
ADIBA NELSON: And I saw something on the news, and they were talking to white women, and they were asking them about who they planned on voting for and why they were voting. And this one woman said, “I know she’s talking a lot about like, reproductive rights and abortion care and women’s rights, but that doesn’t really affect me or concern me at this point in my life. So it’s not that big of a deal.”
And I think that’s a big part of how we got here.
SAM DINGMAN: That makes me think about the so-called blue bracelet movement.
NELSON: Lord.
DINGMAN: Can you tell us what that is? It strikes me as a — there’s some criticism of that as a somewhat me-centric initiative.
NELSON: And I can’t say the things I want to say because this is public radio. I will leave it clean and that gets you fined by the FCC.
It’s basically — I should not laugh because I’m sure it was thought up with the best of intentions. But it’s just such a misstep. It’s this idea that you can wear something to identify yourself as safe. And if you wear a blue bracelet, it lets Black folks know, “Hey, you’re safe with me. I’m not like them. I’m a safe person.”
DINGMAN: “Them” being Trump voters?
NELSON: Yes. And it’s performative. It’s saying, “Me. I’m safe. Come talk to me.” A blue bracelet will not change anything. Take off your blue bracelet and go talk to your friends who don’t think like you. Have the uncomfortable conversations at dinner.
DINGMAN: Right. It strikes me from the way you’re describing it, that it makes the person wearing the bracelet feel better, not the person who feels victimized by the forces that the blue bracelet supposedly signifies a lack of affiliation with.
NELSON: Right. So do you remember back in the day there was this show “MADtv”?
DINGMAN: Yes.
NELSON: And there is this character. I think his name was Stewart. I think his character was supposed to be like an overgrown child, essentially. And any time he would do the slightest little thing that was of non-consequence and non-anything, he would come to you like, “Look what I can do!”
That’s what this blue bracelet reminds me of. “Look what I can do!” And I’m like, I don’t. That means nothing to me.
DINGMAN: Well, can I ask you, Adiba, how are you feeling about politics more structurally, shall we say?
NELSON: Well, I was a Harris voter, but I am not a Democrat. I’m an independent voter. The Democrats as a whole lost my guaranteed, if you want to call it that, vote a few years ago when they basically assumed that they would always have the Black vote and the Latin vote, and they said as much. Like they literally said that, “Well, we’ve got that. Polls.”
No, no. We’re not a given all the time. We’re not a monolith. Y’all know that. It’s starting to feel more like both parties are trying to see who can outdo the other. Instead of who can work the hardest for the American people.
DINGMAN: We’ve seen a lot of reports coming out in the aftermath of the election about conversations within the Democratic Party that seem to suggest that the elders of the party, most powerful people in the party, feel like Democrats have focused too much on LGBTQIA+ issues or racial justice issues.
Those are being seen as “too woke,” and that there’s this idea that there needs to be this refocus on economic issues. Have you seen those reports, and what do they make you think about?
NELSON: It makes me say, if you don’t think economic issues touches each and every one of those communities, you’re already lost. If you look at the disabled community — among the poorest of the poor, yet the things that they need often cost the most. If you look at LGBTQIA+ community — whether it’s health care, whether it’s safety economics is is a part of that.
Economics touches every single community, specifically marginalized communities. If you want to call it woke, call it woke. But wake up. Like, wake up. This is the world we’re living in.
It’s not the good old days. It will never return to the good old days because the good old days were not good for everybody. And if that’s what they want to go back to, then again, is it any different from the Republican Party?
DINGMAN: Well, so you alluded to this earlier, but just to ask you to expand on it a little bit: What would your personal recommendation be to somebody who, perhaps misguidedly, has put on a blue bracelet and is genuinely believing that they’re doing something that is useful? What, in your opinion, would be something that would be more useful for that person to do?
You mentioned the idea of having a difficult conversation at the dinner table, but what are some other concrete steps you’d like to see people take rather than this more, as you put it, performative version?
NELSON: Go find a community organization that is actually doing the work that you think your blue bracelet will do for you. Ask a Black woman if they feel safer with you because you have a blue bracelet on, and be prepared for whatever answer you get. If you get yes, great. If you get, absolutely not, be prepared for that. Regardless of if we’ve known you our entire lives. Like I have to know you know you as my white friend to be like, “Yeah, we’re cool.”
And I remember feeling that in 2016, like going to Trader Joe’s and being like, “Mmm, I don’t know if just because we’re reaching for the same round of goat cheese that we actually believe in the same things.” Even if I saw your blue bracelet as we reached for that goat cheese, all it tells me is that you’re really good at wearing blue bracelets.
DINGMAN: Yeah. Well, then if I’m hearing you right — and tell me if I’m misinterpreting — there has been a lot of presumption on the part of folks on the left that Black women in particular will shoulder a lot of the burden of working on behalf of Democrats, broadly speaking.
It sounds like one of the things that you’re asking white women in particular to do is to take the kind of extraordinary steps that they have maybe expected or presumed that Black women would take previously to try to understand things a little more deeply.
NELSON: That work that we’ve been doing, you do it. We’re kind of hanging up the cape. I can’t tell you how to act in a more effective way. But I can ask you to ask yourself this question: How is your blue bracelet actually, factually changing the lived experience of someone you are trying to make aware that you are safe?
If you cannot list one way in which that blue bracelet is actually, factually making a mark change in someone’s daily lived experience, then it’s pointless. It’s not doing anything. It’s a fashion statement.
