Cory Booker, a 2020 Democratic hopeful, has recently revealed his strategy to capture the votes of America’s minorities: quote 30-year-old rap lyrics and hope for the best.
The New Jersey Senator and presidential candidate arrived in Simmonsville, South Carolina on Friday, for an early campaign appearance. Booker is set to deliver a keynote address at the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Sunday, the site of a brutal police beatdown of civil rights marchers in 1965.
Before his bridge engagement, Booker was quizzed on what he will do to capture the minority vote next year, and offered rap lyrics in response.
“The hip hop generation is my generation,” @CoryBooker says, in response to a question about how he will get out the minority vote.
“I don’t want you walking around here like, ‘Don’t believe the hype.’ I want you to be like, ‘Fight the power!’” pic.twitter.com/IJyg4GKnIC— Meg Kinnard (@MegKinnardAP) March 1, 2019
“The hip-hop generation is my generation,” Booker said. “I don’t want you walking around here like ‘Don’t believe the hype.’ I want you to be like ‘fight the power,’” he added, name-checking two tracks by the hard-hitting political rap group Public Enemy.
Twitter was unimpressed. “Ending mass incarceration, enacting reparations, promoting an Equal Rights Amendment, providing free/massively subsidized post-secondary education” are all things Booker could have mentioned, one commenter said, “instead of a couple of quotes from that one thirty-year-old album he could remember.”
Ending mass incarceration, enacting reparations, promoting an Equal Rights Amendment, providing free/massively subsidized post-secondary education
– some things @CoryBooker didn’t say instead of a couple of quotes from that one thirty-year-old album he could remember https://t.co/0MxUClxHM3
— 𝙹𝚊𝚛𝚎𝚍 𝙹𝚘𝚑𝚗𝚜𝚘𝚗 (@JaredParker) March 2, 2019
I appreciate the nod to Public Enemy but i would still like to know your plan to energize not only the black vote but a whole new generation of voters. And i hope its more than legalizing marijuana.
— Darmetrias Roberson (@DarmetriasRobe1) March 1, 2019
While Booker’s rap references might reek of ‘fellow kids’ desperation, the New Jersey Senator seems to be a lifelong fan of Public Enemy, mentioning the militant New York rappers in a pair of tweets from 2012.
“Don’t Believe The Hype” Public Enemy
— Cory Booker (@CoryBooker) July 3, 2012
Great meeting u! #Great80sRap RT @emiryclaire: Just bonded with Cory Booker over Public Enemy and education in America #hegotgame
— Cory Booker (@CoryBooker) June 2, 2012
At least Booker was 19 years old when Public Enemy dropped their influential second album ‘It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.’ His fellow 2020 Democratic contender Sen. Kamala Harris (California) drew ridicule when she recently claimed to have listened to west-coast rappers Tupac and Snoop Dogg while she smoked marijuana “in college.”
The problem? Harris graduated from Howard University in 1986 and UC Hastings College of the Law in 1989. Tupac and Snoop released their first albums in 1991 and 1993 respectively.
Kamala Harris claims to have smoked pot in college while listening to Tupac and Snoop.
Tupac’s first album came out in 1991.
Snoop’s first album came out in 1993.Kamala Harris graduated college in 1986.
🤔🤔🤔 pic.twitter.com/8BU0h27I12
— all about the Benjamins baby 🎶 (@joshieecs) February 11, 2019
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