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Republican convention had few African Americans

Trump convention wrap
Trump happy with Republican convention 41:10

Anyone watching the Republican convention probably noticed the obvious: it was white - on and off the stage.

Party officials won't say exactly how many delegates are African American. In June, it was reported that 18 black delegates, less than 1 percent of the total, were expected to attend the Cleveland convention. This is a lower proportion of black delegates than were at the 1964 convention with Barry Goldwater, a Republican candidate who opposed the Civil Rights Act.

How voters reacted to Donald Trump's RNC speech 05:33

Earlier this week, the New York Times reported an estimated 80 delegates were African Americans out of 2,472, or about 3 percent. This was an estimate based on a headcount that could have included black audience members mistaken for delegates.

The picture on the stage was slightly more representative but not by much. Based on the program published by the Republican National Committee and the initial announcement last week by the RNC, only about 15 percent of the speakers were non-white.

This includes Senators and former presidential candidates Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, who are Hispanic, and Dr. Ben Carson, an African American former presidential candidate. For comparison, the Democratic National Convention, taking place next week, has published a preliminary program where 38 percent of the speakers are non-white, two and half times that of the Republicans.

If the racial breakdown of these delegates and speakers is indicative of the popularity of the Republican Party among minorities, these numbers are alarmingly low. Trump continues to say that he will reach out to minority voters, but his efforts so far do not seem to be working.

Trump's popularity among African Americans has consistently been in the low single digits. In a recent NBC/Wall Street Journal poll of Ohio and Pennsylvania, two crucial battleground states, Mr. Trump earns zero percent of African American's support.

It is unclear so far what these efforts will look like and how the candidate himself will engage in them. Omarosa Manigault, a former contestant on his reality TV show The Apprentice, was recently hired as the campaign's Director of Outreach for African Americans.

Trump's rhetoric has not softened, however. In an interview with Hannity on Fox News earlier this month, Trump implied he would "talk with the Attorney General" about the Black Lives Matter movement because it's "essentially calling 'death to the police'."

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