Obama scolds Black men for not supporting Harris: 'I've got a problem with that'
'Outnumbered' panelists discuss former President Barack Obama's message to Black men, blaming sexism for the lack of male support for Vice President Kamala Harris.
NFL icon Herschel Walker spoke out against former president Obama for his recent controversial comments about Black men not supporting Kamala Harris.
During a recent campaign stop for Harris in Pittsburgh on Thursday, Obama addressed the vice president's dwindling support among Black voters, especially Black men.
"Now, I also want to say that that seems to be more pronounced with the brothers. So if you don't mind, just for a second, I've got to speak to y’all and say that when you have a choice, that is this clean: When on the one hand, you have somebody who grew up like you, went to college with you, understands the struggles [and the] pain and joy that comes from those experience," Obama said.
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Maher poked fun at the fact that former President Barack Obama had to resort to "scolding" Black men into supporting Harris. (Michelle Gustafson/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Obama even suggested that these voters aren't currently supporting Harris because she is a woman. Obama did not at any point acknowledge that the lesser support may be because of her record as vice president and deeper career history as a prosecutor.
"I’m speaking to men directly — part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren’t feeling the idea of having a woman as president, and you’re coming up with other alternatives and other reasons for that," Obama said.
Walker is one of many public figures, on both sides of partisan lines, who have criticized Obama for his comments this week.
[Barack Obama], you forgot how hard we fought for our right to vote! Telling us how to vote based on color is a step backward. The bad policies of Biden/Harris have hurt us all. We need unity brother, not division!" Walker wrote in a post on X on Saturday.
Walker is a former all-American football running back who played in the NFL for 12 seasons. Prior to that, he played for the upstart USFL league that intended to compete with the NFL. Former president Trump was an investor in the league and the owner of the league's New Jersey Generals franchise, that Walker played for.
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L.A. Times columnists claimed that former Georgia Republican Senate candidate Herschel Walker was a Black person who promoted white supremacy. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Walker is most known for being part of one of the most iconic trades in NFL history in 1989. The trade sent Walker from the Dallas Cowboys to the Minnesota Vikings, in exchange for players and NFL Draft picks that the Cowboys used to build a team that won three Super Bowls in four years from 1992 to 1995.
In 2022, Walker won the Republican Senate nomination in Georgia by an overwhelming majority of the vote after receiving the endorsement of Trump. However, the race between Walker and first-term Sen. Warnock went to a runoff, because neither candidate received a majority vote in the general election. Warnock ended up winning in the runoff.
Still, despite losing, Walker has been a vocal proponent of other right-wing figures and principles, and he has been a vocal advocate for Trump during this election cycle.
Walker also has a brief history of political interactions with Obama as well. The former president went on a long tirade mocking the former running back during a speech in Georgia ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. Obama said that Walker was "someone who carries around a phony badge and says he is in law enforcement like a kid playing cops and robbers," and has a "habit of not telling the truth." Obama even suggested that Walker would be so loyal to Trump, "it means he is not going to be really thinking about you or your needs."
Walker pushed back on Obama’s comments in a statement days later.
"President Obama was here last night. He said I’m a celebrity. He got that one wrong, didn’t he? I’m not a celebrity, I’m a warrior for God," Walker said. "He needs some help, because he got with the wrong horse. Senator Warnock is the wrong horse. You know he can’t do the job, and it’s time for him to leave."
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Former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama appear on stage in between their addresses on the second night of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center in Chicago, Ill., on Tuesday, August 20, 2024. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images) (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
Now, Walker has taken another shot at Obama in a week of very poor press for the 44th president.
Obama has also been criticized by prominent figures on the left, including Bill Maher, former Democratic Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner and Former BLM activist Xaviaer DuRousseau, who said in a Fox News interview this week that Harris has been struggling with Black men because of her "lack of accomplishments." DuRousseau also said Obama's were "offensive."
"It's absolutely disrespectful, and we're done with Obama," DuRousseau said. "Black men are sick of being reduced to being forced to think with our skin color."
Obama’s comments followed a September 30 Pew Research poll finding that only 84 percent of Black people said they were planning to vote for Kamala Harris for president, while 13 percent said they were backing Trump. By contrast, Joe Biden won 92 percent of the Black vote in 2020.
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