Obama to address Al Sharpton convention

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Updated: August 4, 2011 4:20PM

He avoids race, so the story goes. He can’t afford to alienate white voters, black people will vote for him again anyway, so he has little to gain by approaching such a volatile subject.

Yet today, President Obama is scheduled to make a foray into racial territory by speaking in New York at the Rev. Al Sharpton’s national convention — an early step on the tricky path that Obama must navigate in order to engage black voters who are crucial to his re-election.

Obama remains highly popular among blacks. In 2008, 95 percent of blacks who voted chose Obama. In a Gallup poll last week, 84 percent of blacks approved of Obama’s overall performance, about the same percentage as six months ago.

But it’s actually harder for him to reach out to black voters than it would be for a white president, said Mark Neal, an African-American studies professor at Duke University, “because there’s a narrative that he’s catering to a black constituency.”

“Obama needs Al Sharpton as a certain kind of surrogate for black voters,” Neal said. “Symbolically, his willingness to speak at the convention is a subtle message to black voters that he is paying attention to their concerns.” AP