FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Betty Anne Williams
August 30, 2012 

Joint Center Reports on African American Voters and the Republican Party

WASHINGTON, DC—The Joint Center for Political and Economic studies has released its quadrennial report, Blacks and the 2012 Republican National Convention, showing there are at least 47 African Americans among this year’s GOP convention delegates, or 2.1 percent of the total in Tampa.

There were 38 black delegates to the Republican Convention in Minneapolis in 2008 or 1.6 percent of the total number of delegates. The largest number of black Republican delegates ever to attend a Republican Convention was in 2004 when there were 167, or 6.7 percent of the total; the event was held in New York.

The Joint Center’s Convention Guide provides a comprehensive look at African Americans, their voting patterns and preferences and their relationship as voting citizens to the Republican Party. It contains historical data about black voting patterns in recent decades and focuses on states where the black vote has the potential to affect the outcome of the presidential election as well as several Senate contests.

A similar guide to the Democratic Convention will be released next week when the Democrats meet in Charlotte, NC.

“The new report, Blacks and the 2012 Republican National Convention, continues the Joint Center’s role as the go-to source for information about African Americans and their participation in the American political system,” said Ralph B. Everett, the President and CEO of the Joint Center. “African American voters are a potent political bloc that neither major party can afford to ignore.”