FAIRBURN, Ga. – As Reps. Wesley Hunt from Texas and Byron Donalds of Florida has kicked off the latest iteration of its “Congress, Brandy and Cigars” event with the goal of bringing more black men into the Republican fold here on the outskirts of Atlanta, the two donald trump allies set their intentions for the conversation.
“All we want is for you to listen to us,” Hunt said, maintaining that the public did not have to agree with everything he said and would have the opportunity to express their own opinions.
Over the course of the roughly two-hour conversation, moderated by former ESPN host and conservative podcaster Sage Steele in a cigar room filled with a diverse but predominantly black audience, several black men seized the opportunity.
Donalds and Hunt were repeatedly challenged by several attendees about their legislative record, positions on immigration and reparations, and their unwavering support for Trump. The dialogue at times turned contentious, with several audience members accusing lawmakers at various points of repeating generic Republican talking points or deflecting on issues of concern.
The event highlighted the challenges that Trump’s black allies may face in trying to win over independent or traditionally Democratic voters in cities like Atlanta, some of whom remain skeptical of the Republican Party despite its efforts to more aggressively court voters. blacks.
The discussion began with Donalds and Hunt urging the public to defect from the Democratic Party, arguing that President Biden and Vice President Harris “do not have the recipe for success in this country.”
But in the second half of the event, the atmosphere turned contentious when Steele asked the room what the main issues they would like to hear the congressmen address. Among them were immigration, national security, and “morals.”
Jason R., a retired black college-educated husband and father who declined to give his last name, clarified what “morals” meant.
“A local representative brought an amendment to the defense bill to reinstate a Confederate monument that has a depiction of a ‘mother’ receiving a white baby from a Confederate soldier,” he began: “Of the four black Republicans, three voted ‘yes’ on this.”
“It seems misleading to come here and talk about issues and then vote on what is apparently not principled,” Jason said.
Hunt responded by telling an anecdote about several members of his family, including himself, who attended the West Point military academy. Hunt said he saw value in residing in the “Robert E. Lee barracks.”
“Only in America can you have three black children enroll in the premier leadership institution in the entire world and graduate there and live in a barracks named after a Confederate general,” Hunt said. “If it had a different name. I wouldn’t have that perspective.”
Donalds was also called to a controversial observation he made during the “Congress, Brandy and Cigars” tour stop in Philadelphia, during which he asserted that the Black family was strongest during Jim Crow.
“You can talk about the black family, talk about the black father, but when you weave Jim Crow into it, you will alienate people,” Richard Wright said at Wednesday’s event.
Donalds maintained that his comments were misrepresented, saying he was referring to “empirical data” from the period that suggested higher marriage rates among black Americans.
“Nobody wants Jim Crow to come back,” Donalds said. “We were talking about black families and I was referring to a time.”
Donalds suggested that the backlash he received over the comment was the result of Biden’s campaign targeting him for being a Trump vice presidential candidate.
“We’re in the middle of a presidential election, let’s call it what it is, yes, I’m on the list for the vice presidency,” Donalds said. “The reason my comments were interpreted this way is because the Joe Biden campaign, which has no answer to what is really hurting Black Americans today, they wanted to take my words and twist them to say that I wanted Jim Crow returned. That’s crazy talk, I don’t want that.”
The response did little to calm the palpable frustration among some participants. One participant, Mike M., who declined to give his last name, is a graduate of Emory University and is not affiliated with any specific party. He vehemently pointed out that Donalds himself made the comment and “was trying to blame everyone else.”
“You don’t have to invoke Jim Crow to make your point,” he said.
As the conversation turned to immigration, several members of the crowd intervened as Republican lawmakers criticized Biden over security at the southern border.
One participant, Allen Hill, asked, “What are you going to do to fix this?” and hesitated when Donalds responded with Republican proposals to close the border, restrict the asylum process, and use ICE to carry out mass deportations, which several audience members framed as “Republican talking points.”
“That’s not an answer, that’s a narrative,” Hill said.
Donalds and Hunt had supporters in the room: one of them, Horace Holland Jr., grew tired of other audience members’ line of questioning on immigration, stating vehemently that the conversation should focus on addressing the plight of black Americans and not of undocumented citizens.
“Why are you more worried about people who entered illegally getting amnesty when a black man can run away for 20 years but when they find him he doesn’t get amnesty!” Holland said.
Another point of contention centered on reparations.
“I’ll tell you: I don’t believe in reparations,” Donald began.
“Then you don’t understand the black community,” Hill responded.
Donald tried to explain his position.
“If you’re going to talk about reparations today, what you’re talking about is taking money from other Americans,” Donalds said. “You are asking Americans today and in the future to foot this bill. Is it their bill… to pay?
Although Donalds and Hunt appeared to have their fair share of supporters in the room, few were as vocal as the dozen or so attendees who throughout the event intervened multiple times to challenge the two, some of whom later told NBC News that they did not identify as Democrats. or Republicans, but rather as “conservatives”.
“I think we got points and frustrations and got things out there that we wanted to communicate to the people who came here and said they wanted to have an honest conversation with black men in the Atlanta community,” Jason R. said of the event.
Hunt and Donalds also said they gained valuable information from the speech, emphasizing that they would continue to travel to cities with large black populations to interact with voters.
“I know we have some spirited people here. There are some Democrats here, there are some people who don’t agree with us,” Hunt said. “What we didn’t want to do, as 50% of black Republicans in the halls of Congress, was not be here. That’s the worst thing we could do: not show up.”
“We can have these disagreements, that’s okay. But when we leave this room, I understand your point of view, you understand mine, we respect each other’s differences, we move forward, we build better, we do better – that’s what really matters,” Donalds added.
Hunt said the two plan to bring the next “Congress, Brandy and Cigars” event to Milwaukee, closer to the Republican National Convention in July.
This article was originally published in NBCNews. with
