words by Charles Brooks
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Photo Credit: Marco Verch
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Although the much talked about
blue wave managed to sweep in a number of black elected officials during the 2018
election cycle – the nation still has no black governors.
This year’s election cycle saw an
unprecedented 3 blacks running for governor; Ben Jealous (Maryland), Stacey
Abrams (Georgia) and Andrew Gillum (Florida) each won their respective
primaries but lost in the general election.
The race in Maryland was settled on election night with Jealous pulling
in 43.5% of the vote with over one million votes, but lost by over 270, 000
votes. The races in Florida and Georgia, however were too close to call on
election night forcing Gillum to withdraw his concession while Abrams pointed
to the thousands of uncounted votes left on the table and just flatly refused
to concede her race.