My Warning to Black Voters Who Want to Stay Home This Election

Paul Sancya/AP

Genuine question: Do influential white people routinely tell members of the white community to not vote?

Every four years, it seems like noteworthy figures within the Black community repeat a familiar refrain: Black voters should withhold their vote to prove a point.

In 2020, it was musician Ice Cube, and in 2024, it’s activist Dr. Umar, both using their considerable platforms to push a consistent, if overused, message to Black people: Don’t vote until politicians make concrete promises to you. These calls for inaction are often mistaken for activism and overlook the fact that both major parties have made commitments to Black voters in past and present elections.

“Have you ever noticed,” I ask in a new video, “that conservative white voters are rarely, if ever, told they should withhold their vote?”

“Have you ever noticed,” @garrison_hayes asks in a new video, “that conservative white voters are rarely, if ever, told they should withhold their vote?”

His new video looks at why that is. WATCH 👇 pic.twitter.com/OLeRwYZtzW

— Mother Jones (@MotherJones) October 29, 2024

I explain that Christian Nationalists have a long history of supporting policies aimed at reducing the voting population in order to accomplish, as my colleague Ari Berman describes it, “minority rule.” Consider Paul Weyrich, co-founder of the Heritage Foundation—the recent force behind Project 2025. In 1980, during a far-right conference in Dallas, Weyrich made his hostility toward democracy clear: “Our leverage in the elections, quite candidly, goes up as the voting populace goes down.” The strategy is obvious: It fundamentally relies on Black voters staying home.

I have extensively covered the ongoing debate surrounding Black voting this election cycle. Watch my in-depth exploration of the rise of the Black MAGA movement below.