To reach Black men, Kamala Harris should campaign in barbershops

Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee for president this year, knows she faces an enthusiasm gap with Black male voters. But does she know how to reach them?

“It’s very important to not operate from the assumption that Black men are in anybody’s pocket,” Harris said recently during an interview with the National Association of Black Journalists. “You got to earn their vote. So, I’m working to earn the vote.” 

She could start by literally meeting Black men where they are: the barbershop. 

Although Harris attended a panel in a South Carolina barbershop in November 2019, she seems to have spent little time visiting Black barbershops during her current bid for the presidency — to her detriment. In addition to several Black male celebrities who have associated themselves with Donald Trump, such as actor and rapper Ice Cube (star of the movie "Barbershop"), a new NAACP poll reveals that more than one-fourth of Black men under 50 plan to vote for Trump.

Harris could easily make her case in the thousands of barbershops that dot America. It is there where Black men of varied socioeconomic status and age gather to get haircuts, while socializing and discussing issues of the day.  

For those who say a woman can’t connect with men in such a space, I did. I spent two years hanging out in a barbershop in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, researching my upcoming book, “The Headmasters of Brooklyn: Barbering, Blackness, and Brotherhood.”

When I tell people about my work, their first question is, “What was it like being a woman in that space?” rather than, “What were Black men discussing? Or: “What are their cares and concerns?” Black male constituents deserve to have the Democratic nominee for the presidency demonstrate they matter to her.

Harris may sit in the situation room in her role as vice president, but a lack of presence in Black barbershops seems to rest on a troubling notion: that women, especially women of color, need to ask permission or have a surrogate to enter male-dominated spaces. Harris’s women constituents need to see her confidently present in these predominantly male public spaces. 

If I can enter a Black barbershop to conduct ethnographic research for several years, then Harris can tour barbershops in Philadelphia, Detroit, Atlanta, Milwaukee and beyond to chat with Black men.

Harris’s team has effectively used social media and influencers to target Gen Z. Harris has toured dozens of small, local businesses. She should remember the barbershop is a historically important business and social space for Black communities.

Black barbershops have been sites for people to organize politically against racial inequality and to get Black men who have been disenchanted with electoral politics registered to vote. Doctors have even used the barbershop to improve public health, training barbers to screen customers for hypertension and other conditions that disproportionately affect Black men and often go undiagnosed and untreated. 

Because barbershops in working-class urban neighborhoods are also frequented by middle-class Black men who live in more affluent, suburban areas, the barbershop could also be a site for Harris to reach suburban, politically moderate swing voters and older generations who are less likely to encounter her messages on social media. She could reach Black men who are eligible but not registered to vote.

Harris could recruit Black barbers to talk to their customers about making a plan to vote, verify their voter registration at voter-registration stations, and outline the main issues on the ballot. 

Harris, who has mostly avoided discussing her race and gender, should lean into the powerful optics of Black barbershops, just as President Biden and former President Barack Obama did. She should keep the longstanding tradition of Black politicians visiting the barbershop during their campaign to signal her interest and commitment to the issues and needs of Black communities. 

Unlike myself, who spent years in one barbershop listening to the men’s organic conversations, Harris has less than two months to build rapport with Black men across the country. Harris will have to enter with a set agenda and be prepared to discuss criminal legal reform and housing insecurity, conditions that make it difficult for Black men to vote.  

Shatima Jenique Jones is a clinical assistant professor in the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University and a Public Voices Fellow.