Donald Trump’s supporters are so desperate to cut into Joe Biden’s black vote numbers that they are handing out money?
Folks?
The general election HAS already begun between Trump and Biden….
Trump has been trying to hurt Biden with his son Hunter….
Now we have his surrogates trying to buy black voters?
Allies of Donald Trump have begun holding events in black communities where organizers lavish praise on the president as they hand out tens of thousands of dollars to lucky attendees.
The first giveaway took place last month in Cleveland, where recipients whose winning tickets were drawn from a bin landed cash gifts in increments of several hundred dollars, stuffed into envelopes. A second giveaway scheduled for this month in Virginia has been postponed, and more are said to be in the works.
The tour comes as Trump’s campaign has been investing its own money to make inroads with black voters and erode Democrats’ overwhelming advantage with them. But the cash giveaways are organized under the auspices of an outside charity, the Urban Revitalization Coalition, permitting donors to remain anonymous and make tax-deductible contributions.
The organizers say the events are run by the book and intended to promote economic development in inner cities. But the group behind the cash giveaways is registered as a 501(c)3 charitable organization. One leading legal expert on nonprofit law said the arrangement raises questions about the group’s tax-exempt status, because it does not appear to be vetting the recipients of its money for legitimate charitable need.
“Charities are required to spend their money on charitable and educational activities,” said Marcus Owens, a former director of the Exempt Organizations Division at the Internal Revenue Service who is now in private practice at the law firm Loeb & Loeb. “It’s not immediately clear to me how simply giving money away to people at an event is a charitable act.”
Asked about the legality of the giveaways in a brief phone interview, the Urban Revitalization Coalition’s CEO, Darrell Scott, said that most gifts were between $300 and $500, and that the group mandates that anyone who receives over $600 fills out a W-9 form in order to ensure compliance with tax law. He did not respond to follow-up questions about how the giveaways were structured and whether they met the legal standard for a charitable act.
Scott declined to name the donors funding the effort. “I’d rather not,” he said. “They prefer to remain anonymous.”….
image…thefederalist.com
Many many Republicans have long held a cynical (not to mention racist) view that most African-Americans onky vore for Democrats because of “handouts”. Or in other words economic policies that might help middle and working class folks instead of just the alrrady wealthy
Back in the day they only discussed this amongst themselves though and would never have blatantly done anything like this.
However like everything in the Trump Era the Republican party is just more comfortable using bullhorns instead of dog whistles.
The money offers won’t change things…
Blacks, Browns and Yellows along with a good amount of Whites numbering more than 50% of the total vote will NOT cast a vote for Donald J. Trump come November 3, 2020….
As it was in 2016?
It will matter WHERE the vote comes from….
Not the overall numbers…