Facing disastrous poll numbers and collapsing support ahead of vital elections this year, the US Republican Party's strategists have taken firm aim at a surprise voting bloc -- black Americans.
The White House and top Republican officials have launched a blitz to persuade black people that their future will be better served by shedding decades of loyalty to the Democratic Party. Prominent black Americans, including a Hall of Fame football star, are Republican candidates in several high-profile races for November's mid-term elections.
Ken Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, has been speaking at events hosted by traditional black civil rights groups such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Urban League. The national committee has organized at least 50 events aimed at black Americans. Later this month, Republicans will hold their first workshops for training black candidates.
If the Republican move succeeds, it will mark a reverse of one of the longest trends in US politics that has seen black Americans -- who once voted Republican in the segregationist Democratic South and were often attacked by the Ku Klux Klan for doing so -- shun the party after the civil rights reforms of the 1960s, when Republicans adopted a "Southern strategy" of attracting mainly white voters. Republicans admit that they have their work cut out.
"We have a lot of ground to make up, but we have a message that is resonating," said Tara Wall, director of outreach communications for the national committee. "We are now talking to people we have not been talking to before."
In the last presidential election only 8 percent of black people voted for US President George W. Bush. But Republicans insist that they see grounds for optimism and, if they succeed, they say they will have prised apart one of the key foundations of Democratic electoral support.
They hope that socially conservative ideas pushed by Bush on issues such as limiting abortion and opposing same-sex marriages will appeal to many black voters.
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