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Politics

'WE DISINFRANCHISED OURSELVES': Stephen A. Questions Black Voters' Loyalty to Democratic Party [WATCH]

posted by Hannity Staff - 9.17.25

Legendary ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith argued Tuesday that Black voters’ unwavering loyalty to the Democratic Party weakens their political influence.

Speaking at the Front Office Sports Tuned In Summit, Smith pointed to November’s election, where President Donald Trump won 13% of the Black vote — including 21% of Black men and 7% of Black women, according to a CNN exit poll.

In a debate livestreamed on Front Office Sports’ YouTube channel about Trump’s growing support among Black men, Smith said both parties prioritize outreach to Latino voters because they are not locked into one party.

“[S]ince 1964, when [former President] Lyndon B. Johnson told the world, ‘You know what? When we pass civil rights legislation, okay, guess what? We’ll have the Negroes voting for us for the next 200 years.’ And sure enough, over the past 60 years or so, a vast majority of African-Americans have voted Democrat,” Smith said. “We know that if we’re doing our homework, we serve to disenfranchise ourselves, because we told the Democratic Party, ‘You got our vote no matter what.’ We told the Republicans, ‘You ain’t getting our vote no matter what.’”

“Neither [party] was incentivized to really put forth an effort to give us the representation we deserved. And as a result, we disenfranchised ourselves. But we’re not seeing it that way. You got migrants coming to this country that clearly see it that way,” he continued. “Look at the Hispanic population. You got Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Guatemalans, everybody, Cubans, everything. And you don’t know who’s going to vote what. So guess what? Both sides are trying to appeal to them, which means they’re not being ignored. That’s the game. And unfortunately, we as a black community lost our way in that regard.”

Watch the clip below: