Amy Klobuchar Has Similar Struggles As Pete Buttigieg with Black voters

[LeftTurn3623]

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/mollyhensleyclancy/amy-klobuchar-iowa-pete-buttigieg-black-voters-2020


In a Washington Post poll of black voters earlier this month, Klobuchar was at 0% to Buttigieg’s 2%.

Now Klobuchar is facing criticism there this week over revelations about her decades-old prosecution of a black teenager. A group of black leaders in Minnesota called for her to suspend her campaign in light of an Associated Press investigation suggesting the 16-year-old boy Klobuchar put in jail for life may have been innocent.

Her home state’s two most prominent black politicians, Rep. Ilhan Omar and Attorney General Keith Ellison, endorsed Bernie Sanders. Outside of Minnesota and the early states of Iowa and New Hampshire, she has scarce support from people of color, including just one elected official, California Rep. Linda Sanchez, who endorsed her Saturday. No black elected officials have announced their support for Klobuchar in other states.

Perhaps more significantly, Klobuchar faces serious hurdles to winning over black voters moving forward: She spent a chunk of her career as a tough-on-crime prosecutor and has been criticized for failing to prosecute a single killing by the police when she headed prosecutions in Hennepin County, Minnesota’s largest county.

The revelation of serious flaws in the case Klobuchar built against Myon Burrell, the teenager Klobuchar charged with the murder of an 11-year-old girl, Tyesha Edwards, in Minneapolis, is likely to cause a further issue for Klobuchar.

Klobuchar has repeatedly used Burrell’s prosecution to bolster her own political career — including during her first Senate run, when she cut an ad with Edwards’ mother, who said, “When our little girl, Tyesha, was murdered, Amy saw to it that those gang members were put away.” And she brought the prosecution up in a recent Democratic debate, where she cited the case to deflect criticisms that she had not been committed to racial justice.

“I would say that Amy Klobuchar does not have any real connection to the black community in [Minneapolis] or in Minnesota,” said Nekima Levy Armstrong, a community activist and civil rights lawyer who joined calls for Klobuchar to suspend her campaign and address the Burrell case.

“She has portrayed herself as a tough-on-crime prosecutor while working to appeal to mainstream white middle-class voters. But the reality is that Klobuchar did measurable amounts of harm to the black community when she was the lead prosecutor in Hennepin County,” Levy Armstrong said.

Klobuchar has also been criticized for failing to bring charges against a single police officer who killed a citizen in her eight-year run as the top prosecutor in Minnesota’s most populous county. There were more than two dozen police-involved killings in that period. Minneapolis police have long faced allegations of excessive force — leading to unrest that culminated in widespread protests over the 2015 killing of Jamar Clark.

Deborah Berry, a Buttigieg supporter who served for 14 years as one of Iowa’s few black legislators, said she felt Klobuchar’s appeal to people of color should be receiving equal scrutiny.

“I do feel like it’s unfair,” said Berry, who endorsed Buttigieg in December and defended his record on race in a phone interview on Friday. “He encourages people to speak out,” she said, asking why voters didn’t have similar questions for Klobuchar. “It’s really frustrating.”

Leslie Redmond, the president of the Minneapolis NAACP, who had joined calls for Klobuchar’s campaign to be suspended, raised another contrast: between Klobuchar and another former candidate who was a prosecutor, Kamala Harris.

Black leaders in Minneapolis say they want Klobuchar to suspend her campaign in order to focus on helping Burrell, who is now 33.

“There’s no way that a person who represents good, old-fashioned Midwestern values can sit back silently and allow an innocent person to suffer inside the criminal justice system, knowing that they had a role in putting them there, and even using the case as a talking point in the debate,” said Levy Armstrong.

“Her response has been to try to deflect and put the focus on the current prosecutor. But if she’s going to take credit for putting this man behind bars in the first place, she needs to take responsibility now.”

[underthematrix]

1. I have to disagree with this. African Americans like Amy K and would come out and vote for her.

[squirecam]

2. Here we go with an old article smear....

Your post leaves out very important FACTS.

The defendant was tried and convicted twice. Amy was not involved in the second prosecution.

On appeal, the defendant claimed he had witnesses to support him, but they recanted or failed to show. Multiple continuances were given by the judge so the defendant could prove his case.no affidavits were submitted.

In any event, Amy has called for a further review, and that’s the appropriate step.

The case info is here. For people who want actual evidence to rely upon.

https://cases.justia.com/minnesota/supreme-court/2015-a13-1769.pdf?ts=1423072899

On July 17, 2013, the postconviction court denied Burrell’s postconviction petition. The court determined that Burrell had “provided virtually no additional evidence,” and that the substance of any new evidence was “highly speculative” and “likely cumulative.” The court concluded that it had provided Burrell with opportunities to present evidence from the witnesses, time for counsel to explore possible remedies to secure the witnesses’ testimony, and multiple continuances. The court also held that it had no authority to issue a bench warrant for Brown’s failure to appear at the March 26 or March 27, 2013, hearings because Brown had not been properly served with a subpoena for those dates.

[democrattotheend]

9. It's not old for most people

Most people are just starting to pay attention to Amy. She's been scrutinized less than most of the other candidates, including Bernie. We should welcome scrutiny of all our candidates now, so we can see how they deal with it and how big of a problem it is before we decide on a nominee.

That said, your rebuttal makes a lot of good points that make me feel a little better about this.

I did think it was ridiculous that some racial justice organizations in Minnesota called on her to suspend her campaign over this, when it seems like there's not a lot of evidence that the conviction was erroneous and there doesn't seem to be any evidence that she engaged in prosecutorial misconduct. But I've only read up on this a little bit. I would like to know more, but that is my impression as of now.

[BusyBeingBest]

3. Wuh oh, Buttigieg making a whattaboutism of AmyK, just in time for SC!

[LeftTurn3623]

4. well why not

Pete has been hammered on this issue for months - talked about nonstop and Amy just gets a pass with less support from AA than Pete.

[BusyBeingBest]

5. To be fair, Amy may have less support because until last Friday her campaign

wasn't seen as viable and no one knows who she is. I think she will have to build her support in a hurry.

[LeftTurn3623]

8. same thing I said about Pete

never stopped the media heads talking about it

[BusyBeingBest]

11. I think Pete got much, much, MUCH more help from the media

than he was hurt by it, to this point. Seriously, they propelled his candidacy from the get-go. Amy got a beat-down on her announcement day last year with stories of sobbing staffers, and then was ignored until pretty much last Friday. So I wouldn't complain too much about the media if I were the Pete camp.

[squirecam]

7. We will see who the voters choose

Posting smears won’t help you convince them.

[LeftTurn3623]

10. smears?

I find that insulting

I just seen how many threads about Bloomberg and his issues - post about Pete and his issues

But a post about Amy's issues is a smear?

[Nanjeanne]

6. Yes but it was only a problem in 2016 when it was Sanders with the problem!

[judeling]

12. It was stupid then

it is stupid now.

[squirecam]

13. More drive by smearing without facts or context

Nt

[judeling]

14. The big difference is Pete has been working on it.

Because he has had to with his top tier status to little effect.

It is Amy's turn now. But she has actually a pretty good story. While tough on crime, that is not a bad thing in the AA community as long as it isn't a cover for something else. And she has a lot on the other side of the ledger. Indeed a lot of the "evidence" in the AP story is available because of the reforms she put in place.

She cleared the county Jail right away of all the harassment charges that are used to target the AA community. She brought in the Innocence Project right away to work on standards and relations. She shifted resources to White Collar crime. There is a lot there to sell.

And when it comes down to it there are issues with almost all of our candidates with the community, they all will have to prove themselves and that is what should happen.

It is finally Amy's turn outside of Minnesota and Ellison's power play will end up failing I believe.

[FloridaBlues]

15. Amy and Pete will go through the vetting process we will see how it plays out

With their past and minority issues.