For South Carolina's Black communities, immigration issues blur party lines
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jun/20/south-carolina-black-voters-immigration
For South Carolinas Black communities, immigration issues blur party lines
In the states most diverse district, some recoil at the US border closing while others wrestle with impacts of undocumented migration
George Chidi
Thu 20 Jun 2024 06.00 EDT
Republicans claim that their election year rhetoric about immigration has a new audience in the Black community. North Charlestons newfound racial complexity tests that claim.
The working-class city of about 120,000 is one of the most strongly Democratic in South Carolina, more so than even its larger, storied neighbor to its south. It has also long been split almost evenly between Black and white residents. Immigration has been adding a third dimension to what was a two-way relationship.
In the neck of the barbell-shaped city, between the primarily white northern neighborhoods and the primarily Black southern neighborhoods are stretches where the shops advertise in Spanish and almost all the children getting off the school bus are Latino.
[...]
Immigration can be a tough topic to discuss in South Carolinas Black community, which isnt keen on offering white conservatives who regularly attack cities as crime-infested yet another reason to snipe at North Charleston, especially in an election year when immigration rhetoric on the right has become increasingly toxic.
[...]