Politico does a piece on gentrification/migration in Washington D.C. that points to break up of large concentrations Black neighborhood’s that result in a more intergraded America, but a less potent ‘Blaclk’ vote….That with the Black population of America that IS growing…
More than 50% of it is in the South , Republican country where voters suppression efforts are the strongest….
Washington’s story is, in a sense, just one instance of a nationwide trend: Nine of the 10 American cities with the largest Black populations experienced a decline in Black residents over the past two decades, according to census data analyzed by POLITICO. Among them are cities that for decades have had deep connections to Black politics and culture, including Chicago, Detroit and Philadelphia.
Among cities with the most Black residents, 9 of 10 had decreases since 2000
But D.C. is also special: It was the nation’s first large city with a majority-Black population, a milestone it crossed in the late 1950s amid a mass movement of white residents to the suburbs. Today, a good chunk of the city is still Black, most notably in the Southeast, across the Anacostia River, which divides much of Black Washington from the rest of the city. But the population overall is now almost evenly split between Black and white residents, with small but growing Latino and Asian populations, census data shows. That shift has reverberated in many ways — in the city’s arts and culture; in its street life, most noticeably in Shaw and a handful of other traditional Black cultural districts; and in the city’s politics.
Politically, Washington for decades was a city where, outside the action on Capitol Hill and the White House, “power” meant Black power, with City Hall effectively dominated by the city’s Black residents. Today, that powerbase is sharing influence uneasily with a new constituency, political strategists say, that is younger, often more liberal — and predominantly white. The city has had an unbroken string of Black mayors since it first won self-determination in the early 1970s, but in recent years they have been buoyed by coalitions of Black and white voters and forced to wrangle with a City Council that increasingly represents the interests of well-off, non-Black professionals….
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…goals of restoring Black D.C., of stemming the tide of loss, may ultimately be achievable only via a multiracial coalition….