President
Barack Obama on Wednesday announced an initiative he said will give
African-American students greater access "to a complete and
competitive education from the time they're born all through the time
they get a career."
Speaking
Wednesday night at a National Urban League gathering in New Orleans,
Obama said he has issued an executive order establishing the White
House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African Americans,
saying, "A higher education in a 21st century cannot be a
luxury. It is a vital necessity that every American should be able to
afford," he said.
He
added that his administration is "pushing all colleges and
universities" to cut their costs.
The
president focused the bulk of his comments on the economy, saying his
tax policies and economic plans aim to boost the middle class.
"We
also believe that every entrepreneur should have a chance to start a
business, no matter who you are, no matter what you look like,"
he said. "That's why we've helped African-American businesses
and minority-owned businesses and women-owned businesses gain access
to more than $7 billion in contracts and financing that allow them to
grow and create jobs."
A
spokeswoman for presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt
Romney responded to the speech, saying Obama has "disappointed"
African-Americans with his performance on the economy.
"As
black Americans, we all take pride in Barack Obama's historic
election," said Tara Wall, senior communications and coalition
adviser for the Romney campaign, "but unfortunately his
performance as president has not matched that enthusiasm. He's
disappointed black small business owners, failed to address rising
black unemployment -- which now stands at over 14%, and is double
that among our youth -- and failed to address the widening economic
disparity gap."
Obama's
executive order comes in the wake of a new report by the National
Urban League's Policy Institute that warned the president could lose
three key battleground states -- Virginia, North Carolina and Ohio --
if African-American voters don't match their strong turnout of 2008
in this year's election.
"African-American
voters tipped the outcome of the 2008 presidential election in
several key states, and are poised to do so again in 2012," said
the report, titled "The Hidden Swing Voters: Impact of
African-Americans in 2012" by Madura Wijewardena and Valerie
Wilson.
"How
this will manifest will depend on many things, but one important
factor will be whether the extraordinary growth in turnout by
African-American voters in 2008 will be replicated in 2012," the
report continued. "The 2008 voter turnout rate was driven by
historic factors that may not necessarily apply in 2012."
The
"historic factors" reference was to Obama being the
nation's first African-American nominee of a major party, with voters
having the opportunity in 2008 to make him the nation's first
African-American president.
This
time, an economy struggling to recover from a recession that hit
African-Americans particularly hard has raised questions about
whether Obama supporters will have the same fervor as they did four
years ago.
A
recent Gallup Poll showed the president with overwhelming support
among registered African-American voters, with backing of 89%,
compared with 5% for certain Republican nominee Mitt Romney. In 2008,
Obama won 95% of the African-American vote, with 4% voting for GOP
candidate John McCain.
About
2 million more African-Americans voted in the 2008 election than in
2004, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures. Voting by all minority
groups accounted for nearly all the increase in turnout (5 million)
between the two election cycles, as white non-Hispanic voting was
virtually unchanged, the Census Bureau reported.
A
decline in African-American voter turnout to the 2004 level of 60%
from the 2008 level of 64.7% would cause Obama to lose in North
Carolina and possibly lose in Ohio and Virginia, according to the
National Urban League Policy Institute report.
Obama
won all three states in 2008, and most scenarios for Obama's
re-election depend on him winning at least two of them this time.
Ohio has 18 electoral votes, while North Carolina has 15 and Virginia
has 13.
A
fierce start to the election campaign, with the candidates and their
supporting super PACs launching bitter attacks, has made ensuring
enthusiastic backing from traditional support bases a key to victory
in November.
The
president's speech Wednesday concluded a four-day, six-state swing
that started earlier than planned Sunday so he could visit Aurora,
Colorado, after last week's mass shooting at a movie theater.
During
the speech, Obama made some of the most forceful statements of his
presidency on the issue of gun violence, saying that while he
respects the nation's hunting and gun-owning traditions, "We
should leave no stone unturned and recognize that we have no greater
mission as a country than keeping our young people safe."
Isa 30:2 That walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth; to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to trust in the shadow of Egypt!
Isa 30:3 Therefore shall the strength of Pharaoh be your shame, and the trust in the shadow of Egypt [your] confusion.
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