Chapter Sixteen: Never Run From the Front

I once knew a Black guy named Leslie Johnson. I met him in 2008, when I was working for that union campaign in Cincinnati, trying to convert Black voters on gay marriage.

As part of my outreach, they sent me to talk to the Hillary Clinton campaign, and I ended up face to face with Leslie.

Remember, this was 2008. Barack Obama was running. And it was after the South Carolina primary, when things got nasty, and Bill called Obama a “fairy tale.” There was the additional swipe about Dr. King being a big part of getting civil rights laws passed, but “it took a president to get it done.” 

And then there was the whole thing about Obama losing support with “hard-working Americans, white Americans.” And of course there was the past with the Super-Predator comment. For most Black people I knew then, it was just not okay to fuck with Hillary over Obama. 

Black women got a pass, because Hillary is a woman. But a Black man, in 2008, who was a Hillary supporter, for the most part was either getting a b…