The forum was supposed to be a chance for the candidates to face the people of District 20, but the empty seat on stage was impossible to ignore. Luther Campbell, Uncle Luke himself, the rapper turned political candidate, wasn’t there. I was looking for him the whole time. So was everyone else.
While the other five candidates traded barbs and made their pitches, the man who had been making headlines just days earlier for his explosive accusations against his own party was absent. He later posted on Facebook that he never confirmed the event. “I love a good fight,” he wrote, “but nobody on my team confirmed an event. ”
It was his way of saying he would have shown up if they had asked him properly.
And in this race, every move matters. District 20 is historically a Black access district. Nearly half the constituents are Black. The seat belonged to Sheila Cherfilus McCormick, who resigned under a cloud and is now under federal indictment, accused of stealing five million dollars from the federal government.
But she was back on that stage, running for her old seat, and taking shots at the newcomer. “This is a Black access district,” she said. “If we erase the remedy, we’re erasing the past. ”
The jab was aimed at Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
Her own district was eliminated in the redistricting, so she decided to run here, in a district that has historically been represented by a Black candidate. She now faces five opponents, all of them Black. “I think my record speaks for itself,” Wasserman Schultz said from the stage. “I’ve been a strong fighter over my entire career.
”
But it was the fight that happened before the forum that had everyone talking. Days earlier, Luther Campbell dropped a bombshell. One of Donald Trump’s fiercest critics, a man who spent years calling Trump a liar, suddenly said the unthinkable. “Ladies and gentlemen, I hate to agree with Donald Trump,” Campbell said.
“But on this one, I got to agree with him. ”
He claimed that career Democratic politicians were cheating in the primary. He said people were going to seniors’ homes, offering to take their ballots to the box, then opening those ballots, changing the votes, and dropping them in. “They call them ballot harvesters,” he said.
“I didn’t even know this even existed. ”
He said the operatives had money behind them. He claimed he had footage of a guy with dreadlocks doing it, and that he planned to post it. “You got to win by cheating,” he said.
“Unbelievable. You should be ashamed of yourself. You’re a liar and you’re a cheater. ”
The words stung even more because of who said them.
This was Uncle Luke, the 2 Live Crew legend, one of the loudest voices against Trump in the entire state. Now he was telling Black voters that the Democrats they supported were the real problem. The backlash was immediate. The race turned racial.
It turned personal. And Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democratic leader who had worked alongside Wasserman Schultz for years, wouldn’t even commit to endorsing her. “Haven’t made a decision as it relates to that particular race,” Jeffries said when asked directly. “Everybody has a right to run where they see fit.
”
He acknowledged her strong track record, but he also pointed to the sensitivities of the moment, calling the Supreme Court’s gutting of the Voting Rights Act an “unprecedented Jim Crow-like assault on black political representation. ”
The silence from her longtime ally spoke volumes. Back at the forum, Wasserman Schultz tried to make her case. “Fighting for minorities, jobs, and immigrants is what I’ve successfully done in DC,” she said.
The other candidates pressed on the need for real representation. “Everyone has a voice and a seat at the table,” one of them said. “We must invest in communities that have been left behind and left out. ”
But the question hanging over all of them was whether the district would remain a Black access district in all but name.
And whether a white candidate, no matter her record, had any business stepping into it. Now the polls show Wasserman Schultz as the frontrunner. Elijah Manley, another candidate, has an outside shot. It looks like she could waltz right in and take the nomination, and in that district, the Democrat is almost certain to win in the general election.
But the race isn’t over yet. And Luke’s accusation is still out there, unanswered. The question is whether it changes anything before the primary.
Or whether the voters even get a real choice at all.
