Say It Louder!

Black Voters, White Narratives, and Saving Our Democracy

Tiffany Cross

• Publisher: Amistad
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9780062976765
• eBook ISBN:
  9780062976789
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• Index: Social Sciences

A breakout media and political analyst delivers a sweeping snapshot of American Democracy and the role that African Americans have played in its shaping while offering concrete information to help harness the electoral power of the country's rising majority and exposing political forces aligned to subvert and suppress Black voters.

Black voters were critical to the Democrats' 2018 blue wave. In fact, 90 percent of Black voters supported Democratic House candidates, compared to just 53 percent of all voters. Despite media narratives, this was not a fluke. Throughout U.S. history, Black people have played a crucial role in the shaping of the American experiment. Yet still, this powerful voting bloc is often dismissed as some "amorphous" deviation, argues Tiffany Cross.

Say It Louder! is her explosive examination of how America's composition was designed to exclude Black voters, but paradoxically would likely cease to exist without them. With multiple tentacles stretching into the cable news echo chamber, campaign leadership, and Black voter data, Cross creates a wrinkle in time with a reflective look at the timeless efforts endlessly attempting to deny people of color the right to vote—a basic tenet of American democracy. 

 And yet as the demographics of the country are changing, so too is the electoral power construct—by evolution and by force, Cross declares. Grounded in the most-up-to-date research, Say It Louder! is a vital tool for a wide swath of constituencies.

One

How I Got Here

1

For Colored Girls Who Consider Journalism When Twitter Is Not Enough

Is it too hard to emphatically say Donald Trump was a racist businessman who became a racist reality TV star whom a little less than half the American voters elected as president? Apparently so. For a long time, much of the media found it impossible to declare. In fact, some still do. Perhaps this is why, for some Black people, fake Twitter and Facebook accounts became a more reliable source for news and information than actual “reputable” news outlets during the 2016 general election. The efforts of the Kremlin-sponsored Internet Russia Agency to manipulate Black voters depended heavily on its ability to feign consciousness and call out obvious racism in a way traditional media had not. Racism has so many different shapes and forms, purveyors and tentacles, and has such a huge impact on America. But for too long in the mainstream media, it has been something that dare not be spoken about in an authentic and honest way.

When this type of disconnect impacts politics, the consequences cast a large and dark shadow. Too many would describe Trump’s outright racist remarks as having “racial undertones.” If someone can tell me the difference between a person who makes comments with racial undertones and someone who is an outright racist, I’ll send you a free copy of this book. If you take all of Trump’s actions and rhetoric together, the pattern is clear: he is, by definition, a white supremacist. It is not just political opportunism but an ideology ingrained in his character. Yet for too long, the superfluous question that had been asked and answered was continually posed by the media: Is Donald Trump a racist? When Anderson Cooper posed this question to New York Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in a 2018 60 Minutes interview, she responded (as most seeing, thinking people would): “Yeah, no question.” For some reason, this was the highlight of the interview. The next day, her response made headlines. It was discussed on cable news outlets as though she had said something controversial. Was this really breaking news? No. Still, most of the headlines responding to the interview keyed in on her stating the obvious.

But who cares about speaking a declarative truth when the debate itself is driving badly needed ratings for broadcasters. Just a few years prior, the networks had to figure out how to maintain a loyal audience. With hundreds of channels and curated and tailored information at your fingertips, there’s a constant battle for the TV viewer’s attention. In 2014, cable news was struggling to find its footing in this shifting media landscape, where its audience was not matching up with revenue trends. Cable news had peaked as a medium around the 2008 presidential election, and the business model was uncertain.

All three major news channels—Fox, CNN, and MSNBC—had seen their audiences decline. According to Pew Research, MSNBC’s prime-time viewership had declined 4 percent in 2013, and 17 percent during the day. The Fox News channel had lost 5 percent of its daytime audience. And CNN’s prime-time audience had declined by a quarter, to a median viewership of 495,000, according to Nielsen Media Research data. The total prime-time audience for the three channels combined hovered at the time at around 2.8 million viewers. That amounted to a fraction of the more than 20 million people who were tuning in to one of the three commercial news broadcasts airing on NBC, ABC, and CBS each night.

But with Trump, the cable news networks started enjoying great gains in viewership thanks to lapses in judgment by people who treated intolerance, xenophobia, and misogyny as though it were something to be laughed at and not taken literally or seriously. Former Democratic Minnesota congressman Keith Ellison took it seriously. He appeared on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos in July 2015, was the sole Black person on the panel, and was practically laughed off the set when he said this: “All I want to say is that anybody from the Democratic side of the fence who’s terrified at the possibility of President Trump better vote, better get active, better get involved, because this man has got some momentum. And we better be ready for the fact that he might be leading the Republican ticket.” You can hear his fellow panelists—including the New York Times’s Maggie Haberman, ABC News political director Matthew Dowd, and Republican strategist Ana Navarro—laughing at his assertion. “I’m telling you,” Ellison says, over the audible chuckling, “stranger things have happened.” Stranger things indeed.

Did these members of the chattering class think it was impossible for a white supremacist to occupy the Oval Office? There have been far more bigots in the White House than there have been unprejudiced presidents. Surely they must be aware. Never before heard tapes were released in 2019 of then governor of California Ronald Reagan referring to African delegates to the United Nations in 1971 as “monkeys.” He said to then president Richard Nixon, “To see those, those monkeys from those African countries—damn them, they’re still uncomfortable wearing shoes!” He didn’t say “shithole” countries, but the sentiment is certainly the same—these presidents viewed Black people as inferior and governed accordingly, shaping policy that directly and negatively impacted the Black community. During his first presidential campaign in 1976, Reagan dubbed a Black Chicago woman a “welfare queen,” to perpetuate a vile stereotype of Black women living large on taxpayers’ dollars. He then used her story to attack housing benefits, aid to children in poverty, and food stamp programs. Certainly the panelists were alive during his administration. Had they forgotten?

It wasn’t such a surprise to most Black people that Donald Trump struck an old, reliable chord with many white Americans. But it was disturbing to see his narcissistic antics proving to be a huge boon for the networks. The outlets managed to reverse the trend of audiences tuning them out by casting a reality TV star in the starring role of their daytime and prime-time programming. Fox News, in 2016, led the pack, averaging 2.4 million viewers in prime time. But CNN narrowed the gap with one of its best years, averaging 1.3 million viewers during its prime-time slots. And MSNBC made an enormous leap from where it had been only a year prior, seeing the highest percentage gains of all the three news networks, averaging 1.1 million viewers.

The twenty-four-hour news cycle had found a star, and it was failing the American people. Bigly. Many cable news viewers were older white men—the median viewer age is sixty-six for Fox News, sixty-one for CNN, and sixty-three for MSNBC, according to Nielsen. And the networks’ programming reflected the demographic. Given the type of campaign Trump was running, discussions about race frequently blanketed the networks. Diverse voices, however, did not—on or off screen.

There were endless reports of police brutality. The water crisis in the predominantly Black city of Flint, Michigan, had reached a boiling point. Immigration was also a hot-button issue. Trump, as the Republican nominee, offered up a slew of incendiary racist rhetoric. And when voters turned to cable news to unpack these issues, they were greeted by predominantly white analysts, pundits, and hosts. The TV screen did not reflect America. And there was little to subsidize the opinion alcove, since people were forgoing newspapers. Only two in ten US adults were getting news from print newspapers during the 2016 election cycle.

Broadcast was pulling out all the tricks. The “Breaking News” banner became a permanent fixture across television screens. Is all news breaking? No. And the most sporadic TV news viewers learned that the banner is there simply to attract and hold their attention and not actually to alert them to a worthy occurrence of national importance. Once viewers recognize that this marketing tool is deceitful, it dilutes how viewers respond to actual breaking news. Also, you no longer need to be a subject matter expert, an elected official, or an accredited journalist to earn a steady spot on the screen. You need only be someone who has a strong opinion, a modicum of credibility (to the mostly white people in charge), and the ability to drive ratings. Cable news is now where pundits hold court.

In the 2017 movie I, Tonya, Bobby Cannavale plays a reporter for the tabloid show Hard Copy. In the movie his character says, “[We were] a pretty crappy show that all the legitimate news outlets looked down on . . . and then became.”

The new “news” reality TV. That’s another good way to describe the industry as it started to alter. Argument took precedence over information. The cable news outlets loved Trump-inspired division so much that he didn’t have to personally appear on screen to bring the regular news cycle to a screeching halt. In March 2016, all three networks spent thirty minutes broadcasting live footage of an empty podium bearing Trump’s campaign sign ahead of a planned press conference, effectively giving him and his campaign a free thirty-minute commercial. And it wasn’t like the networks were airing actual commercials. The news channels so loved the shock value of what happened at MAGA rallies that they covered the events live with no commercial breaks.

Over the course of the campaign, Trump earned close to $2 billion worth of free media attention. But not even the circus Trump brought to town was enough to carry an entire story line for months at a time. The cable outlets needed a cast of supporting characters, because like any salacious reality TV show, the “news” circuit desperately depended on conflict. CNN seemed to find that formula with its multiple boxes of commentators squeezed onto one screen. Enter the “don’t come for me” pundits on the left versus the “Trump is my God” sycophants on the right. Who’s the anchor? Not important. Most were essentially assuming the role of the boxing announcer Michael Buffer, sitting atop a breaking news banner yelling, “Let’s get ready to ruumbbbbllllle.”

Viewers didn’t necessarily learn anything, but . . . were you not entertained?? Some talking heads were so offensive that CNN had to fire multiple Trump-supporting commentators. In 2017, Jeffrey Lord was fired for tweeting “Sieg Heil.” And Ed Martin, a Trump-supporting talk show host, was fired for calling other CNN contributors “Black racists,” and “rabid feminists.” This was the intellectual discourse meant to inform the public? Not really. But still, many Black people were hungry to see this type of racist rhetoric swatted down in a public and humiliating way.

Enter Angela Rye. She burst on the scene delivering unapologetic readings of right-wing MAGA supporters and quickly became a household name and cable news favorite. She was part of the diversity the outlets so desperately needed. At the time she began doing television, she had recently completed her time as executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC). This accomplished lawyer had also previously held numerous positions on Capitol Hill and ran a political strategy firm. Yet she sometimes appeared on panels opposite people whose political experience paled in comparison to hers. She once appeared opposite shoplifter-turned-political-consultant Katrina Pierson, who falsely accused Rye of running the CBC “into the ground.” Angela also battled on air with former congressman Joe Walsh, who said that President Obama was held to a lower standard because he was Black, to which Rye responded, “I’m not interested in having a dialogue with someone like Joe, who has demonstrated a propensity towards bigotry.” Understandably, having to dignify such racist remarks takes a toll on the spirit. “I cried after,” Rye told me. “I cry after a lot of segments because I can’t believe this is where we are. At least these bastards used to hide their truth. Now, they are just bold with it, and it’s disheartening.”

But she has also received backlash from some in the Black community who found her sometimes brash delivery to be off-putting and occasionally disingenuous. I must say, Angela is a dear friend whom I have known for years, and I can personally attest that she is the same on air as she is off air. She is passionately driven by a mission bigger than herself. She is laser focused on uplifting Black people and goes out of her way to offer tangible support to those around her and the community at large. She once told me that being on cable was not enough. “If I leave this earth and all I did was be a voice for some Black people on TV, then I have failed. I’m not trying to build a brand; I am trying to build up my community.” Which is why it may be all the more hurtful when the criticism comes from the community. I asked her how being on the receiving end of such harsh critiques impacts her. “Black people aren’t monolithic. Many say I speak for them. I suppose this is the way of the critics saying I do not speak for them. It’s all good,” she replied. “I wish there was a constructive way to go about it, though. I never want my words to be the source of pain for the culture. So to say that some of this criticism has hurt me deeply is an understatement.”

The argument can be made that Black voters, particularly younger Black voters, saw someone who not only looked like them but spoke their thoughts—and they tuned in. CNN saw a 5 percent uptick in their Black viewers in 2017. A more diverse slate of talking heads who were able to call out racist attacks in real time—something many anchors and reporters seemed incapable of doing—arguably brought hundreds of thousands of people into the political process. I can’t say for certain that anyone learned anything from these types of segments. After all, when you have eight people on a screen all talking over each other in heated disagreement, the intellectual exchange gets lost. But seeing people the audience found familiar certainly piqued their interest. One could also make the argument that having more relatable personalities across screens makes politics more palatable to younger generations as well, and may have impacted turnout during the 2018 midterm elections. Generation Z, millennials, and Generation X accounted for a narrow majority of midterm voters. The three younger generations—those ages eighteen to fifty-three in 2018—reported casting 62.2 million votes, compared with 60.1 million cast by baby boomers and older generations. So who says young people don’t vote?

They certainly do on social media. In fact, it appeared that was the intention of these segments: put an obnoxious person on air to square off with a combative guest, and voilà, you’ve got a viral hit on your hands. After each of these explosive cable news segments, it was time for the judges (the audience) to cheer their champion and jeer the opponent. Break out the smartphones. “Like” the obnoxious clips of shouting matches and retweet all the comments you agree with. Tag the opposition in an angry diatribe and eagerly await your favorite pundit to tweet some epic clapback to some right-wing Trump supporter. Find everyone’s public page on Facebook so you can like it or move over to Instagram so you can follow. Google the cable TV personalities to learn about their personal lives, whom they’re dating, if they’re married, study their fashion choices, and so on. But ask the masses to intelligently reiterate the point either side was making? (Assuming there was such a thing.) Nope. Name the issue they were discussing? Verify any data they quoted? Nah. No time for that. If audiences of color were becoming more engaged, cable news was certainly not making them more politically astute.

Long before I ever appeared in front of the camera, I spent a significant part of my career behind the camera. In fact, it’s where I got my start. I cut my teeth on news gathering at CNN. I remember the day I was hired as an entry-level video journalist, in the year 2000 at the world headquarters in Atlanta—it was when the network was celebrating its twentieth anniversary of being the pioneer of the twenty-four-hour cable news. And I got to be part of this innovative media giant. I’d work whatever shift they gave me without complaint. Work weekends? You bet! Work on Christmas Day? Sign me up! Overnights? No problem! I just wanted to be there. I could not believe that CNN was doing me the favor of letting me work twelve-hour days and giving me the honor of getting yelled at in the control room—just like a real-life scene in the 1987 classic Broadcast News. The best part? They were paying me a whopping $22K a year to do what I would have done for free. Mama, I made it.

But I soon discovered there was no welcome mat for me as I entered this world. The journey to get an entry-level slot at CNN had already been filled with pitfalls, and I was surrounded by people who had nothing but launching pads in their youth. I had been on my own since I was sixteen years old. By hook or by crook, I found my way to college—Clark Atlanta University, an HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) in Georgia. But after just a couple of years, I ran out of money and had no idea how to pay my tuition. I had to leave. I had been on the homecoming court, I befriended my professors, I forwent parties for symposiums. Being ejected from the nourishing environment of a historically Black college was devastating. I spent months feeling like a colossal failure destined to live below the poverty line. I was watching my peers soar while I ate ramen noodles and read newspapers on the floor of my apartment because I couldn’t afford furniture. What the hell was I going to do now?

Hell-bent on not letting my circumstances define me, I became desperate. But more than being desperate, I was hungry. I began reciting daily my own version of the famous Henry van Dyke quote, “Some succeed because they are destined, I will succeed because I am determined.” I wrote it on my bathroom mirror in lipstick and would read it out loud, blinking away tears. I began stalking the program director at the biggest urban radio station in Atlanta, V-103 WVEE. I sat in the lobby every day for a week before he agreed to see me. He gave me fifteen minutes, which I used to beg and plead that he give me a shot at news. I had my résumé, printed copies of writing samples, my reel, references, anything he could possibly want. Perhaps out of pity or to get rid of me, he finally agreed to let me fill in doing the morning news slots on their flagship program—the Frank Ski morning show.

The experience of working in radio and being responsible for content made me feel like an Oprah-in-the-making. I took this responsibility very, very seriously. Though no one was ever going to actually lay eyes on me in radio, I wore the nicest of the cheap threads I had in my closet. Nearly one hundred thousand people were tuning in to hear the information I brought them. This was serious business. I had to treat this opportunity as though my life depended on it—because, at that time, it felt like it did. The hosts seemed to love me. It was working well for a few months. I don’t remember what freelance rate they were paying me, but it wasn’t a lot. Yet it was still unbelievable to me that they were paying me at all. So when I met an African American CNN executive while attending a college football game, I was grateful that I had made a practice of carrying copies of my résumé with me—this was before everyone was on email (news flash: I’m actually not a millennial, I just play one on TV—don’t tell anybody!). His name was Gerald Walker. He told me he would speak to ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword: Bearing the Cross by Michael Eric Dyson
• Introduction
• Part One: How I Got Here
• Part Two: How WE Got Here
• Part Three: Where We Need to Go
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Copyright
• About the Publisher