Ben Carson doesn’t “see a political path forward” in the Republican presidential nomination process, and will not attend Thursday’s GOP presidential debate in his hometown of Detroit, he said in a statement.

But Carson stopped short of saying he was officially leaving the race.

The retired neurosurgeon and his aides reached the decision after a staff meeting Wednesday morning in Baltimore following a disappointing finish on Super Tuesday.

In an email to supporters, campaign chairman Bob Dees said the “political efforts must come to a close.”

“We have often said that ‘reality is our friend.’ The reality is that we together have been on an amazing journey — the right candidate for the right cause for the right reasons at the right time,” Dees wrote.

“No doubt many of you have tears as you read this, just as I tearfully write these words — tearfully because the reality is that our political efforts must come to a close,” he added. “Gratefully, the grassroots movement that has given new voice to ‘We the People’ and has inspired millions will continue.”

Carson said he will go into more detail during an appearance at the Conservative Political Action Committee Conference near Washington on Friday.

It appears to end what once seemed like a promising campaign for the first-time political candidate. He was the first GOP candidate to overtake Donald Trump in the polls for a period of several weeks around October. But as fall turned to winter, Carson consistently lost ground to Trump and later Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.

Armstrong Williams, Carson’s business adviser, said it is clear that Trump has things wrapped up.

“Everyone needs to come to the realization that Donald Trump will be the nominee when it’s all said and done,” Williams said in an interview. “And that’s the reality. I know they’re saying they have the best chance of toppling Trump, but let’s admit it, they have no pathway either. And every event, let’s admit it, Trump has done well. … Since Iowa, he has been steamrolling.”

Williams also insisted Carson will back the GOP primary winner. “Dr. Carson will support the eventual nominee,” he said.

Carson never made a cogent argument for his candidacy, running mostly on his biography rather than policy and political views. Carson undisputedly had an impressive personal story to tell. He overcame a troubled youth in inner-city Detroit, becoming a star student and eventually a world-class neurosurgeon. He won international acclaim in the late 1980s after successfully separating conjoined twins.

In June 2008, President George W. Bush awarded Carson the Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award. “For a time, young Ben Carson was headed down that same path,” Bush said at the time. “Yet through his reliance on faith and family, he turned his life into a sharply different direction.”

But Carson’s origin story took a hit after a CNN report raised questions about claims he made about violent episodes as a youth. Trump, rising in the polls, took to mocking Carson, particularly over a story from the surgeon’s memoir about Carson attempting to stab a friend — the knife broke in a half after hitting a large belt buckle.

Carson’s debate performances didn’t help, either. He often seemed halting in his speech patterns in a forum that prizes quick and snappy sound bites. And his command of policy appeared shaky — he asserted that the Chinese were in Syria, a claim the White House disputed.

He repeatedly deflected questions on how to confront ISIS, among other foreign policy challenges. Even on health care, Carson’s seeming specialty, he didn’t have many specifics to offer beyond saying that Obamacare should be abolished.

Carson’s campaign also suffered internal conflicts, with competing power centers often at odds. In the run-up to the Iowa caucuses, a contest that was crucial to his chances because of his connections with evangelicals, the tensions came to a head, with his top advisers leaving the campaign. Adding to the turmoil, Carson’s former advisers were unusually public in their criticism of Carson as a candidate and of his campaign structure.

When voting actually began with the Feb. 1 Iowa caucuses, Carson wasn’t much of a factor except as a spoiler. He finished fourth at 9.3 percent. His New Hampshire primary showing was even worse. Carson finished eighth, with only 2.3 percent of the vote — only ahead of candidates who had dropped out of the race but whose names remained on the ballot. Then in the Feb. 20 South Carolina primary, Carson finished sixth, with less than 8 percent of the vote.

Republican operatives, looking to move Carson out of the race as they try to remove obstacles to finding a challenger to Trump, were planning Wednesday to suggest he drop out and instead run for the U.S. Senate seat in Florida.

John Philip Sousa IV, who operates the 2016 Committee, a pro-Carson super PAC, said he has not spoken with Carson but would be intrigued by the possibility of a Senate race.

“Would he be a great U.S. senator? Absolutely. Would we support him all the way? You bet we would,” Sousa said in an interview.

Sousa suggested the super PAC could back one of the other GOP candidates should Carson endorse one. Another option would be to convert “into an anti-Hillary super PAC, which we could easily do and which we believe our supporters would be very excited about,” to attack the Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton.

For his part, Williams said he thought the Florida concept is a non-starter.

“Isn’t it flattering that people in Florida think so highly of Dr. Carson that they would want him to run for Senate seat in Florida? I think they wanted him to run in Florida because they wanted him out of the race,” he said. “I don’t need to advise him on that because I already know that he has no interest in that. Remember, they also tried to get him to do the same in the state of Maryland, this is not the first time he’s been approached about this.”

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Here are two scenarios for Jan. 20, 2017. That’s the first day on the job for the 45th president of the United States.

Scenario one. President Bernie Sanders or Hillary Clinton, unlike President Barack Obama on his first day on the job, are faced with a Republican-controlled House and a Republican-controlled Senate. That’s a GOP Congress that’s been carefully and deliberately crafted as a firewall against a Democratic president.

It’s a GOP Congress in which the majority leadership has repeatedly made clear their sole mission is to delay, dither, obstruct, gut and torpedo initiatives and legislation of a Democratic president from the budget to all level appointments. In short, a Congress that pretty much did just that during nearly every minute of Obama’s White House tenure.

Scenario two. President Donald Trump, Ted Cruz or Mario Rubio on their first day in office face a Democratic-controlled Senate. Now the script is gently flipped. There is not the hell bent mission to gut or torpedo their initiatives and legislation.

However, if they carry through on their oft-stated collective campaign pledges to build a border wall, plow more ground troops into multiple countries, repeal Obamacare, gut or eliminate the IRS, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Education, and a litany of other federal agencies, not to mention try to dump anywhere from two to four more strict constructionist judges on the Supreme Court and throughout the federal judiciary, then the battle lines will quickly harden. Senate Democrats will be the firewall to their wholesale effort to roll back the 20th century.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is determined to do everything to prevent scenario number one from happening. He is absolutely horrified at the thought of scenario number two happening. So much so that he convened private meetings with GOP party leaders meeting in which he bluntly said that the GOP must do any and everything to ensure a congressional firewall against a Democratic president.

He meant the Senate. He took the virtually unheard of step of telling GOP Senate candidates and incumbents whose seats are on the block to feel free to distance themselves from a Trump presidential bid anyway they can if that’s what it takes to win election or re-election.

McConnell can count the numbers and the numbers are that the GOP must defend 24 seats while the Democrats get the much better of it with only 10 seats to defend. A swing of just four seats to the Democratic column will get the Senate back and give Clinton or Sanders some breathing space in trying to at least get a hearing on their legislative agenda and prospective appointments.

It’s those appointments starting right at the top with the Supreme Court that has the GOP in a nervous sweat about Senate control. It, not the House, is the sole determiner of who sits on the high court, the lower court benches, and key positions in federal agencies.

Those are all top-grade posts that initiate, make and implement crucial policy decisions after many congresspersons are long gone. The Senate majority leader has virtually dictatorial control over which of the president’s nominees are put to a confirmation vote.

The devastating result of that power was on full brute and naked display with the dozens of judicial and agency posts that were endlessly delayed, or outright sabotaged by the GOP-controlled Senate from Attorney General Loretta Lynch to the absolute refusal of McConnell to consider any Supreme Court nominee Obama will propose to replace the late Antonin Scalia. The stonewall of the nominees was so bad that at one point there were more than 150 nominations for executive and court spots that were pending in the Senate.

McConnell and GOP Senate leaders are well aware that this little shell game can be played by two. When Sen. Harry Reid became majority leader in January 2007, he played hard ball with a number of then President George W. Bush’s judicial nominees and delayed hearings. A Democratic Senate majority leader would almost be duty-bound to take a long hard look if not put the brakes completely on the Supreme Court picks of President Trump, Cruz or Rubio.

All almost certainly will do what Bush said and did and what Romney echoed in 2012. Bush said his prototype of an ideal Supreme Court judge was Thomas or Scalia. Romney, with much fanfare, said he would consult with hardline ultra-conservative Robert Bork on Supreme Court picks.

The parade of names they’d send up for confirmation almost certainly wouldn’t look much different than Thomas or Samuel Alito. That would ripple up and down the federal judiciary. The message being that strict constructionist’s like Thomas will face tough sledding in getting confirmed.

President Trump, Cruz, Rubio, Sanders or Clinton, it makes little difference in one respect. The Senate is the real key to the election of 2016.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His latest book is “From Sanders to Trump: A Guide to the 2016 Presidential Primary Battles” (Amazon Kindle). He also is a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on Radio One and the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and the Pacifica Network.

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NAACP President Cornell William Brooks on Monday condemned Republican front-runner Donald Trump and said he represents a “kind of Jim Crow with hairspray and a blue suit.”

“The fact of the matter is this is hateful. It is racist. It is bigoted. It is xenophobic. It represents a kind of Jim Crow with hairspray and a blue suit,” Brooks told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room.” “Let’s not underestimate what we’re dealing with. This is a very, very ugly moment in America.”

But Brooks said he doesn’t hold anything against Americans who support Trump.

“I don’t blame the people — American citizens — for their economic anxieties and a sense of desperation. The fact that their grasping at straws and they grasped onto a bigoted, demagogic billionaire speaks to their desperation, not necessarily his appeal or the strength of his platform,” he said.

CNN has reached out to the Trump campaign for comment, with no response.

Cornell Williams Brooks

The billionaire’s rallies have turned increasingly violent in the past week as supporters have clashed with protesters. Trump was forced to cancel a rally in Chicago over the weekend and was given a scare when a protester rushed the stage Saturday.

And a former Breitbart reporter filed an assault charge against Trump’s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, alleging he yanked her violently from Trump last Tuesday.

“The fact of the matter is he’s engaged in rhetoric that represents a kind of apologetics, if you will, of violence,” Brooks said.

The Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office in North Carolina said Monday it is weighing whether to press charges against Trump for inciting a riot during that rally where the protester was sucker punched by a 78-year-old white man. Trump has said he is considering paying the legal fees for the supporter charged with assault.

Trump campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks flatly rejected the premise of the investigation into Trump’s role in the violent altercation.

“It is the protesters and agitators who are in violation, not Mr. Trump or the campaign,” Hicks said Monday in a statement.

Hicks added that Trump’s speech was “extremely well thought out and well received” and instead focused on the role of protesters, who she said “in some cases … used foul language, screamed vulgarities and made obscene gestures, annoying the very well behaved audience.”

Brooks believes Trump’s behavior is “contemptible” but will “leave that for the prosecutors in North Carolina to determine.”

He added there “absolutely” is a racial aspect to business mogul’s increasingly violent rallies.

“When you call Mexicans rapists, when you use code words like ‘thug,’ where you suddenly can’t distance yourself from the Klan. The fact of the matter is we’ve been in this ugly movie before. In the 1920s the Klan combined an anti-immigrant sentiment in the country with a kind of un-American patriotism with a venue of Christianity,” Brooks said.

Blitzer pointed out that Trump eventually did disavow the Klu Klux Klan.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) — In the wild and whirling age of Donald Trump, President Barack Obama went for stable, sober and conventional.

Obama’s pick of Judge Merrick Garland for the vacant Supreme Court seat March 16 was an intriguing multi-layered move in his last great showdown with Republicans that comes at a time of volatile political upheaval.

His selection demonstrates cold-eyed calculation and represents a clear case of Obama calling the Republicans’ bluff after its leaders made clear they would refuse to consider his nominee whomever it turned out to be.

Garland’s elevation offers a new window into the state of Obama’s political philosophy in the twilight of a presidency that began in a burst of historic potential but has been constrained by the grueling struggle to govern in a polarized era.

The pick, a mild surprise, also seemed to hold up a mirror to the president’s nature. Obama billed himself as the picture of swashbuckling audacity at the beginning of his career but has often proven to be too centrist from some liberals’ tastes on issue from health care to anti-terrorism policy.

Rarely immune to the lofty gesture, Obama also aimed to make a profound statement about America’s political institutions and democracy itself at a time when a vicious election campaign distilled from years of raging partisan heat is tearing at them.

Though he did not mention Republican presidential front-runner Trump by name, Obama’s point was hardly subtle. The president argued that while the rules of politics in a rabble-rousing moment might be fraying, some things — like the nomination of a Supreme Court justice — are so vital that they should be above the partisan swamp.

“At a time when our politics are so polarized, at a time when norms and customs of political rhetoric and courtesy and comity are so often treated like they’re disposable — this is precisely the time when we should play it straight,” he said.

“Because our Supreme Court really is unique. It’s supposed to be above politics. It has to be. And it should stay that way,” said the president who once called out the justices in person over the Citizens United ruling on campaign finance during a State of the Union address.

“To suggest that someone as qualified and respected as Merrick Garland doesn’t even deserve a hearing, let alone an up-or-down vote, to join an institution as important as our Supreme Court,” Obama said, “that would be unprecedented.”

Calling the Senate’s bluff

Obama has admitted that he has sometimes fallen short on the theatrics of the presidency.

But he did not shirk on the stage management as he shepherded Garland into the spring-filled beauty of the White House Rose Garden, the venue for many symbolic and ceremonial presidential moments over the decades.

The president’s appearance validated one of the great truths of Washington — that when someone professes to be above the grubby political impulses of his rivals, he’s usually playing the game at a more sophisticated level himself.

In essence, Obama was signaling to the GOP that whatever political price there is to pay for their refusal to consider his pick, the bill is now due.

“In this sense, then, the president is calling the Republican Senate’s bluff,” said professor Thomas Keck, an expert on the Supreme Court and U.S. politics at Syracuse University.

“If the Senate’s leaders stick to their pledge not to consider or even meet with any Obama nominee, it will be clear that they are doing so solely for partisan reasons and not due to any concerns with the nominee’s qualifications or record.”

There was also another implicit political message for Republicans to digest. Obama could have chosen a more liberal, Democratic-base-pleasing nominee in an election year, but didn’t, disappointing some on the left of his party.

In the context of a campaign that could produce a mandate for a Democratic successor, Hillary Clinton, who has been dragged left by her own party, he seemed to be saying to Republican senators: take what I am offering or you may rue the day.

“President Obama is saying to the Senate Republicans, you can take my 63-year-old now or wait for President Hillary Clinton to bring up a 45-year-old in 10 months,” said CNN Senior Legal Analyst Jeffrey Toobin.

In many ways, Garland is a case of cometh the political hour, cometh the man.

He has been passed over for previous spots on the court as apparently insufficiently historic or youthful, as Obama picked the first Hispanic on the bench in Sonia Sotomayor and then Elena Kagan, who could have decades left to exert her progressive legal outlook.

But the spectacularly conventional nature of Garland’s resume — from Harvard Law to distinguished and unblemished service in the Justice Department to the top appeals court in the land — that worked against him before suddenly became an asset.

So while Sotomayor satisfied his impulse to make history, his later picks of Kagan, his former solicitor general, and especially Garland show a streak of pragmatism often evident during his presidency.

A president hoping to make Republicans look bad for blocking his appointment could hardly have found anyone so objectively qualified to serve.

It didn’t hurt either that Garland had previously been confirmed by several sitting Republican senators when he was nominated by President Bill Clinton.

The picture of unquestioned merit was solidified when Garland took to the microphone in the Rose Garden. His voice cracked as he spoke of the “gift” of his nomination and his love for his family, his nation and the Constitution, coming across as the modest and personable antithesis of the scheming, agenda-driven vortex into which he had just stepped.

And now the Senate battle

Contrasting with Obama’s theatrics, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, in his unspectacular style, put on a show of quiet defiance to stiffen the spine of his troops in swing state re-election contests who may not relish the fight ahead.

“It is a president’s constitutional right to nominate a Supreme Court justice and it is the Senate’s constitutional right to act as a check on a president and withhold its consent,” McConnell said in his flat monotone, like a lawyer stating the facts of a case.

And McConnell, speaking from the Senate floor, showed the president that two can play the political game, reviving an old quote from Vice President Joe Biden.

“‘It would be our pragmatic conclusion that once the political season is under way, and it is, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over,’” McConnell quoted his old Senate sparring partner from 1992.

Republicans trawling for White House hypocrisy might have also taken exception to Obama’s Rose Garden announcement itself, since Biden — a key player in obstructionist Supreme Court confirmation fights in the past, including his orchestration of the rejection of President Ronald Reagan pick Judge Robert Bork — stood alongside the president as he made his speech.

In some ways, Garland’s nomination is a poisoned chalice: it is highly likely that he won’t get a hearing and his chances of claiming late Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat are questionable at best. There is no guarantee, for instance, that Hillary Clinton, if elected president, would renew his nomination, given pressure on her to demonstrate early progressive credentials by appointing a more clear-cut liberal.

That was why Garland’s comments about his nomination being “the greatest honor” of his life other than his marriage and the “greatest gift” other than the birth of his daughters were so striking.

They seemed to hint that even if he does not make it to the bench, Garland may view the fact that he was chosen at all as no small honor. Or he could be a man for whom the prize of the high court is so great that it is worth braving the political fire to come.

If Garland’s nomination does fail, he can go back to his job as top judge of America’s second-most prestigious bench — the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

Thus, Obama will not have torched a less established judicial career, or burned a potential Supreme Court nominee likely to excite liberal ideologues, like Garland’s colleague Sri Srinivasan, who a future Democratic president may wish to put forward.

And while Washington seems resigned to a stalemate in which Garland is left in unconfirmable limbo, the White House may still hope that things could change.

Should November’s election produces a President Clinton — or even the unpredictable ideological prospect of a President Trump — some GOP senators could be tempted to cut their losses in a lame duck session of Congress and settle for the judge they know.

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It was one for the books. The sight of an African-American viciously assaulting a Donald Trump protester at a Tucson campaign rally.

The sight drew gasps and lots of expressions of puzzlement and disbelief. The assault came a few weeks after Trump’s photo-op meeting with some black ministers. He has also gotten some endorsements from an odd assortment of blacks such as Mike Tyson.

Before that, he bragged that he could get lots of black votes. It drew guffaws and snickers since it was just Trump being Trump. The overwhelming betting odds were that Trump could do something that’s mathematically impossible and that’s top the percentage of black voter support that one poll gave 2012 Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney during that year’s presidential election; namely 0 percent.

Romney got his memorable 0 percent from black voters by doing what few GOP presidential tickets in modern times had done and that was to actively alienate black voters. He accomplished that feat with his plan to hack up Medicare and Medicaid, downsize Social Security, gut the thread-bare corporate and financial regulations, environmental protections and their full throated assault on abortion rights that would’ve wreaked untold misery among African-Americans.

Even more than Romney, Trump’s violence drive, race-baiting crusade that nakedly appeals to largely white lower income, less educated, rural and strongly male crowds drive the point home that blacks are not even an after-thought in his drive to snare the White House.

But there’s more to the picture about Trump and black voters as the punches that the black assailant delivered to the Trump protester showed. The black vote in several ways is still very much a part of the GOP’s strategy and tactics to win the White House.

GOP presidents and presidential contenders Nixon, Reagan and both Bushes took great pains to give the appearance that they were not overt racists, and that blatant racism was not part of their appeal.

That included highly orchestrated, stage managed, photo opportunities with black celebrities and sports figures, a handful of key black pitch men and women on the campaign trail with them, and in the case of Bush loading up the Republican convention with a pack of show piece African-Americans to provide entertainment and perfunctory speeches.

With Trump it’s is no different. Besides the handful of comic endorsements he’s gotten from blacks, he’s front loaded his traveling campaign circus act from time to time with two black women — the “Stump for Trump Girls,” a black minister or two, and panned audience shots of black faces sprinkled through his rally crowds.

The next tact is not Trump’s but the GOP’s. That’s to refine the ploy of voter suppression tactics that the GOP has traditionally employed, in times past, from felon bans to blatant intimidation of black and Hispanic voters at polling places. GOP governors and GOP-controlled state legislators will continue to drum up a maze of rules and regulations from ending weekend voting to the rash of voter identification requirements. The aim is still the same: to damp down the black vote total all under the guise of combating voter fraud.

Then there’s Trump’s subtle racial pander, which like the GOP’s voter suppression arsenal of tricks, is hardly Trump’s creation. This is the GOP’s standard use of code words and attack points such as tax-and-spend Democrats, out of control, wasteful government, and welfare freeloaders.

That embeds the notion that minorities, and especially blacks, unfairly scam the system with the active connivance of Democrats and at the expense of hard-working, overtaxed blue-collar and middle-class whites.

If Trump bags the GOP presidential nomination, the GOP establishment will be forced to throw in the towel on its low intensity civil war with him, and resort to yet another favored ploy.That is to bankroll and promote a handful of visible and vocal black conservatives to recite all the stock criticisms of Obama, civil rights leaders and Democrats.

It’s already got failed presidential candidate Ben Carson and the National Black Republican Association on board. This creates the deliberate and false impression that a substantial number of blacks don’t support the Democratic Party despite the polls.

Trump and his black surrogates will pound on the tired theme that the Democratic Party has betrayed blacks and that it practices a modern version of plantationism; that is perennially taking the black vote for granted, while offering no tangible programs for the black poor. Trump will couple that line with his boast that he can put create more jobs for blacks and more affordable health care, and that private sector growth, school choice, and further shredding welfare, is the path to economic well-being and uplift for blacks.

Trump’s aim is not to get any substantial support from blacks, since that’s an impossibility, but to sow seeds of doubt, confusion and even a little hostility toward Clinton among just enough blacks to keep them from the polls in the must-win battle ground states. Judging from the punches thrown by a black at the Trump protester, it may have worked in at least one case.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His latest book is “From Sanders to Trump: A Guide to the 2016 Presidential Primary Battles” (Amazon Kindle). He also is a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on Radio One and the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report Saturdays at 9 a.m. on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and the Pacifica Network.

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LYNWOOD — On a day when presidential primaries were held in four states, Lynwood High School held a mock presidential election March 8 to help students learn the primary process, know the candidates as well as understand the issues and the importance of voting.

Students campaigned with colorful and informative signs, standing behind tables that lined “Presidential Walk” between the school’s administrative building and library, where the election was held. More than 1,000 students from 50 classes turned out to hear government and economic policies debated among five candidates before stepping into the voting booths to cast their votes.

The mock election was part of a nationwide event sponsored by the National Research Center for College and University Admissions. Instructor Claudia Alfaro’s government classes partnered with instructor Lorraine Abbass’ economics class and prepared for more than a month for the mock election as a way to spark a lifetime awareness of civic responsibility.

“We wanted to create immediate interest in the candidates and the issues and stimulate discussion about the American political system,’’ Abbass said. “It was also a way to initiate debate on the role of the media covering the event.”

Students from the two classes collaborated, picked their candidate from among the top five contenders, researched their government and economic policies and built their candidates’ campaign strategy.

“The mock election provided our students with the hands-on experience of running a campaign, really mirroring the primary process through campaigning and speeches,” Lynwood Unified School District Superintendent Paul Gothold said. “It is very important for them to know that they have a say in our government process.”

“This was great practice for our students to learn about the importance of being informed when it’s time to vote, the voting process and how to use an election ballot,” school board President Alma-Delia Renteria said. “It won’t be long before they’ll be voting for the next president of the United States and participating in the democratic process. In the meantime, they practiced and made candidate choices.”

Senior Michael Andrade drew a lot of attention as he portrayed Republican front-runner Donald Trump. Andrade sported a blonde wig and did his best to answer questions from aggressive prospective voters.

Andrade was surprised by the support he received and said he thought he flipped a number of voters.

“I’m actually getting a lot of positive reaction and I’ve managed to win some votes,” Andrade said. “The voters have been impressed with the facts that I’ve presented here today.”

Brian Nuñez led Democratic front-runner Hilary Clinton’s campaign across the hallway, telling students to back his candidate if they wanted to receive help with aid for college tuition.

“It’s exciting to be here, but at the same time the voters can make you nervous because some of them hit you with a lot of questions,” he said. “You have to have a well-rounded understanding of the issues to be able to answer them.”

Carlos Ortega played Democratic challenger Bernie Sanders, laying out his plan to narrow the income gap between the rich and the poor, address illegal immigration and improve healthcare. Looking conspicuously inconspicuous, while his bodyguard, Miguel Carrera, stood behind him in a dark suit, dark glasses and a wired earpiece.

“It’s tough to tell whether (Sanders) is being approached by friends or attackers,” he said. “But the campaign has been very inspiring and has gone really well.”

The sealed ballots were mailed to the National Research Center for College and University Admissions, which will tabulate them and send Lynwood its results. The school anticipates announcing the winning candidate sometime this spring.

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Much has been made about polls that purportedly show that a significant number of Bernie Sanders’ backers say they won’t vote for Hillary Clinton no matter what.

Now Sanders has made it clear as recently as an MSNBC Townhall that he will do whatever it takes to “make sure” no Republican gets in the White House.

You can’t get much more emphatic than that since everyone knows that the Republicans he’s talking about are Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. But Sanders’ forthright and very correct message — maybe more warning — still won’t shake the most rabid Sanders backers. It won’t make much difference to them how many times one says get Trump or Cruz and you get the nightmarish prospect of one, two, maybe even three more Antonin Scalia or Clarence Thomas types on the Supreme Court.

To them, Hillary is take your pick: shady, duplicitous, a bought-and-paid-for corporate and Wall Street shill, and the biggest hit, a virulent war hawk.

And there’s no difference between her and say Trump or Cruz; witness the BernieorBust tag being bandied about. Sanders knows better and not just rhetorically but from firsthand experience in hand-to-hand combat with the GOP in the Senate. He routinely ticks off the monumental damage that the GOP senators and House representatives have done or tried to do or if given the chance again will do from torpedoing climate control measures, to eviscerating Social Security and the Affordable Care Act, to giving away the company store in tax breaks to billionaires and Wall Street.

The rip-off is so bad and blatant that even mega-billionaire and poster boy corporate rightist Charles Koch blushed with shame when he told an interviewer that the system is shamelessly “rigged” for the wealthy, starting with men like him.

The big question, though, is just how many of Sanders’ backers will follow his example and back Hillary, whether they have to clamp the proverbial clothes pin over their nose or not. Even if more than a few follow through on their bellicose pledge not to back Clinton no matter what, that won’t much matter if the majority of them are in lockdown Democratic states like California or New York, where even the skies parting for a GOP presidential contender wouldn’t help them.

However, it really shouldn’t have to come to a clothes pin over the nose vote even without the big scare of a GOP president vowing to do everything he can to take us back to the 20th century. The thing that is either missed or wildly and deliberately skewed, distorted or maligned is the reason that Clinton got to where she is in the first place as the Democratic presidential choice.

There’s the relentless two decade-long GOP campaign of rumor, smears and outright lies against Hillary and Bill Clinton both within and without the White House, and you have a pattern of deceit and duplicity against a politician virtually unprecedented in American political annals. This easily could have tagged her as hopelessly politically damaged goods. But it didn’t.

Even when polls show that many voters dislike her, distrust her, or speak derisively of her, the one thing that can’t be denied is that she’s been one of the best prepared White House candidates in years.

Her experience in international relations and her hands-on administrative experience in White House policy affairs have ensured the allegiance of millions of voters to her. And they have shown that in the key primary elections such as New York.

The same polls that play up her negatives also showed that from the start of her campaign that she was the one sure Democrat who would beat any GOP contender. That’s still the case in a head-to-head matchup with either Trump or Cruz.

Millions of women see Clinton as the gender Obama. Her presidency will mark a historic presidential breakthrough for women. She will be a role model and inspiration for millions of women, young and old, in the world’s top political power spot. There’s the perception that she has the political savvy to wage the blood battles with a GOP-controlled Congress.

There’s also the political reality about the shape of a Clinton White House. She is a moderate, centrist Democrat who will give a hard nod to the interests of minorities, gays and women. She will continue and expand Obama’s policies that expand government programs and initiatives, hike spending on education, health care and jobs and markedly increase taxes on corporations and the wealthy while enforcing and even tightening regulations on the banks and Wall Street.

Sanders supporters rail that none of this is enough and that this is hardly the political revolution that a Sanders’ White House would usher in. But Sanders himself put the lie to that when he talked about how no matter how much a president talks radical change with a Congress that won’t support even the timidest reform measures, it’s all just a feel good field of dreams.

In the end, Sanders call to back Clinton is not the easy call. It’s the only call. And it doesn’t require a clothes pin over the nose.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His latest book is “From Sanders to Trump: A Guide to the 2016 Presidential Primary Battles” (Amazon Kindle). He also is a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on Radio One and the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report Saturdays at 9 a.m. on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and the Pacifica Network.

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Donald Trump is the last man standing in the race for the Republican presidential nomination. I guess hell is freezing over down there.

Trump assumed control of the Republican Party May 4 as its presumptive presidential nominee after Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich exited the race, moving swiftly to consider vice-presidential prospects and plan for what is expected to be a costly and vicious six-month battle for the White House against Democrat Hillary Clinton, who has all but virtually clinched the Democratic nomination.

I have spent very little time covering Trump. When he first entered the crowded field of 17 challengers in the race for the GOP nomination, I viewed the whole Republican field as a clown show not to be taken seriously. Trump, the former reality TV show host, was expected to be the biggest clown of all with his funny hairstyle, outlandish statements, and comments that seemed to offend everyone from women to minority groups.

In fact I stated to tell several friends last year that hell would freeze over before Trump would win the GOP nomination. This week Trump pulled off what many of us thought was unbelievable. Trump, who has proudly touted how he has self-funded his campaign, said he would begin actively seeking donations for his campaign and raise money for the national party, part of the arduous task of coalescing a party deeply divided over his toxic brand of politics.

Party leaders are scrambling to stave off a parade of prominent Republicans endorsing Clinton, but already there were notable defections. The two living Republican past presidents, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, have no plans to endorse Trump, according to their spokesmen.

In the swing state of Nevada, Gov. Brian Sandoval, a moderate Republican and rising Latino star, said he plans to vote for Trump despite their disagreements on some issues. But Republican Sen. Dean Heller said, “I vehemently oppose our nominee” because he disparaged women, Hispanics and veterans — although Heller insisted he would not vote for Clinton.

Democrats rushed to exploit the moment. The Clinton campaign released a brutal video mash-up of Republican rivals condemning Trump’s character and fitness for office, while the former secretary of state called him “a loose cannon” and invited Republicans and independents seeking an alternative to Trump to join her.

In states coast to coast, Democrats tried to link embattled Republican senators and other officeholders to Trump in hopes that the shrapnel from his polarizing candidacy would impair Republicans down the ballot. Some Republicans tried to keep mum about Trump, and others gave puzzling statements that sought to walk a tightrope between embracing him and distancing themselves from him.

As some conservative commentators lit up social media with images of burning GOP registration cards, some party elders called for a healing process and sought to quiet talk of an independent protest candidacy. I’m gearing up the marquee matchup now in view: Clinton vs. Trump.

There are still some wrinkles to be worked out — an independent (or minor-party) challenger might shake things up, but most people assume Clinton is the prohibitive favorite in this contest, and that’s fair. Current polling shows Trump would start the race as a historically unpopular candidate.

But nobody should be handing Clinton the keys to her old house just yet. Clinton over Trump is not a foregone conclusion — not in 2016, the year of such mistaken assumptions about the nature of American politics.

A generic sense that Trump has a puncher’s chance is now widespread. Usually, it involves a new development in Clinton’s legal troubles or a jarring terrorist attack that could change everything, and The Donald has proved sufficiently surprising by now that we are obliged to offer a heartfelt, “Who knows?”

But there are three particular factors making Trump a bigger threat to Clinton than is generally acknowledged.

• Concerns about bigotry aren’t the vote-mover you might think. Trump’s long history of outrageous statements combined with America’s current demographics, convinces many people he is dead on arrival. Should we assume that Trump will fare historically poorly among minorities, given his reputation for what many have labeled bigotry? Maybe. But then again maybe the notion that “everyone’s a little bit racist” is more widespread than politicians (and respectable commentators) often admit.

People care about bigotry most if it translates into harmful acts. There are some allegations of that: Trump’s real estate company allegedly committed some serious acts of discrimination back in the 1970s, and voters will hear a lot more about that before November. But the evidence of Trump’s racism is mostly a record of careless remarks.

Trump will surely make plenty of heartfelt declarations that there is no hatred in his heart, and then wave off his past insensitivities by saying, “Well, I’ve said a lot of things.” And so he has. That will be enough for many people — probably more than you think.

Trump also has an extremely low bar to clear to beat recent Republican performances with minority voters. In 2012, Barack Obama won a staggering 93 percent of African American votes, 71 percent of Hispanic votes and 73 percent of Asian American votes. Whatever one can say about Trump, he presents a radically different kind of choice from Mitt Romney. Can he really do much worse?

• Trump is much better at dictating the terms of engagement

That brings us to the second factor working in Trump’s favor: He has proved to be a brilliant manipulator of the terms of engagement. In terms of style and substance (or lack thereof), Trump made the Republican field talk about what he wanted to talk about and discuss the world in a more Trumpian way.

In contrast, in her 2008 and 2016 primary campaigns, Hillary Clinton allowed her opponents to set the terms of debate to a striking extent. In 2008, that led to her primary defeat and in 2016 to a surprisingly hard road to primary victory. Trump’s strength and Clinton’s weakness on this front make it hard to be confident that Democrats will succeed at setting the agenda in 2016.

• Clinton will be forced to defend the status quo

That means Democrats should not be overly confident that they make the election a referendum on Trump, the man. Surely if they could succeed at doing so, Clinton would win in a landslide.

But Trump will be selling voters something more than his outsized personality; he will be asking for a choice between “Trump, the middle finger to the way things have been,” and “Clinton, the choice of more of the same.” One doesn’t have to like Trump to choose the former. Indeed, there will be more than a few voters who talk themselves into the idea that only someone with as many obnoxious qualities as Trump will be capable of upsetting the necessary apple carts.

Clinton’s sales pitch is that she has a strong and steady record as first lady, senator and secretary of state who has learned how to work the system. That past as a consummate insider leaves her uniquely disadvantaged to defend against Trump’s anti-establishment attacks.

Clinton and future opponents of 21st century Jacksonian politics — Trumpian or not — need to find ways of offering their own broadly resonant version of “us.” Affirming the status quo isn’t a viable way of doing that today, and therein lies Clinton’s vulnerability.

None of that makes Trump the favorite to win in November. Although Trump’s qualifications and temperament have suffered glancing blows in the Republican primary, they will be relentlessly pummeled in the general election campaign — where his base is a much smaller piece of the pie.

That will badly hurt him with Americans who have a minimal sense of little-c conservatism and a strong aversion to scary-tale risks. But Trump has managed to shake the foundations of American politics like no candidate before.

Whether that was enabled by genius or luck (in politics, they are often difficult to disentangle), we should not underestimate him. I’ve already made that mistake. Our country can’t afford to make it.

For news tips, email Brothernajeeali@gmail.com.

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With the California presidential primaries approaching in June, supporters and protestors of Republican frontrunner Donald Trump gathered last weekend in Northern California to voice their opinion on Trump’s statements, policies, business acumen and the New York real estate giant himself.

The business tycoon kicked off the three-day Republican Convention April 29 at the Hyatt Regency in Burlingame, 16 miles south of San Francisco, to a crowd of 600 advocates at a $100-a-plate luncheon.

Supporters cheered and greeted the mogul with enthusiasm and hope. Attorney Chet McGensy from San Francisco was the sole African-American supporter among those in attendance.

“I believe that the African-American community is in a terrible state right now in the country, so we have to be able to look at opportunities in terms of rectifying those issues,” McGensy said. “When you look at tons of other issues, health issues, crime issues and everything else, it really stems from creating economical empowerment to influence all those other areas. I believe that Mr. Trump is really focused on the issues and that’s why I’m really interested in supporting him.”

Trump reiterated his plans of making America great again by bringing back jobs to the U.S., having better trade agreements and building a 1,000-foot wall along the border of Mexico.

The television personality has been leading in the primaries and said he is looking forward to being the party’s nominee to become the next president of the United States.

“When I can focus on Hillary, as I say, ‘Crooked Hillary,’ she’ll go down easier than any of the people we just beat,” Trump said.

He said the road to the presidency is far more challenging for Republicans than Democrats and the need for unity to exist among conservatives is critical.

Republicans are widely known as the party of President Abraham Lincoln. Historically, the party of the emancipation attracted the majority of black voters and politicians.

But more than 50 years ago, African-American voters began to migrate away from the GOP. Democratic Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson ended segregation, captivating more black voters.

In 1964, Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater was the Republican Party’s nominee for president. He believed the Civil Rights Act was unconstitutional. His statements attracted many white voters in the South, paving the way for the southern strategy used by Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan.

With the majority of black voters today identifying with the Democratic Party, Trump is adamant in attracting African-American voters.

In Myrtle Beach, South Carolina a day before Martin Luther King Day, Trump said he would create more opportunities for African Americans in a year than President Barack Obama has in nearly eight years.

“We have an African-American president and the black youth, the African-American youth, has essentially all never done worse,” Trump said. “You look at the unemployment in the ’50s. You look at African-American people that are 30 and 35 and 40, in the height of their strength and lives, and they’re doing horribly.”

Hundreds of protestors rallied outside of the convention during Trump’s speech. Activists with Black Lives Matter, Code Pink, and Democratic nominee supporters were demonstrating with every intent to stop him from entering the hotel.

Minutes after Trump left the convention without taking any questions from the media, picketers were able to get past the plethora of police officers guarding the entrance to the hotel and unfurl a banner from inside the hotel that read, “stop hate.”

Protestor Odalis De La O Cortez of Hayward said she is appalled by the amount of hatred that is being projected by Trump.

“I’m here not so much to hate, but I feel more bad for his supporters because they’re planted with all this hatred,” the first generation college student said. “Nobody is born hating somebody else. They’re taught it.”

The remainder of the GOP convention remained peaceful during the speeches of the other two Republicans vying for the nation’s top political position — Gov. John Kasich of Ohio and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. The two candidates had a group of supporters who stood by their policies, but it would be their last weekend on the campaign trail.

After Trump swept to victory in the Indiana primary May 3, both Cruz and Kasich suspended their campaigns.

Prior to his departure, Cruz voiced California’s vital role for the future of the Republican Party.

“California is going to decide this Republican primary,” Cruz said. “I could tell you right now, we’re going to spend more money in California than we raise in California. We are all in and we’re going to compete for all 172 delegates in California and all 53 congressional districts. It is going to be battle on the ground, district by district by district.”

Madlen Grgodjaian wrote this article for California Black Media.

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LOS ANGELES — Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton brought her campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination to Los Angeles May 5, attending fundraisers and courting black and Latino voters by vowing to raise the national minimum wage and create jobs.

Clinton met with local black leaders during a stop at the California African American Museum in Exposition Park, where she touted her lead over her competitor, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

“I am 3 million-plus votes ahead of Senator Sanders, right?” Clinton told the crowd. “I am nearly 300 pledged delegates ahead of Senator Sanders.”

Among those in the crowd at the event were Reps. Maxine Waters and Karen Bass, both D-Los Angeles, and Los Angeles City Council President Herb Wesson.

Later in the day, she attended a boisterous rally at East Los Angeles College, where she again derided presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump as a “loose cannon” and a “risk we cannot afford.”

“Now as president, creating good jobs and raising income will be my number-one priority,” she said. “And we will follow the lead of California and raise the minimum wage.”

Clinton also vowed to guarantee equal pay for women.

“And we’re also going to follow California’s lead and make sure we have paid family leave for working families,” she said. “I will do everything I can to make the economy work for everybody, to help more people lift themselves out of poverty, lift themselves into the middle class and go as far as their hard work and talents will take them.”

At least two other presidential candidates have spoken at East Los Angeles College and gone on to be elected — John F. Kennedy in 1960 and Clinton’s husband, Bill, in 1992, according to Maria Iacobo of the Los Angeles Community College District.

Members of Union del Barrio, MEXA of East Los Angeles College, LA Brown Berets and several other student and community-based organizations held a march through Monterey Park to East Los Angeles College to protest what organizers called Clinton’s attacks on working-class communities of color and her 2002 vote as a senator in favor of the resolution authorizing military action against Iraq.

“This event is to let Hillary know that she is not welcomed in Los Angeles and to raise community awareness of what she really represents. We will let the community know that either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton would make terrible presidents,” said organizer Ron Gochez.

“This action is strictly to protest against Hillary Clinton and not in support of any party and/or candidates.”

There was no response to an email sent to the Clinton campaign seeking comment.

Ninio Fetalvo, spokesman for the Republican National Committee, said Clinton is faltering in her effort to win over Latino voters.

“Hillary Clinton is scrambling to win a nomination she should have locked down months ago,” he said. “Worse, the more Bernie Sanders campaigns in California, the more it looks like he will once again turn Clinton’s false Latino firewall claim on its head.”

The trip is the 68-year-old Clinton’s 11th to the Los Angeles area since declaring her candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination on April 12, 2015.

Clinton has held 24 fundraisers during her previous visits, including a $33,400 per person event at the Studio City home of actor George Clooney during her last visit, when supporters of Sanders, threw dollar bills at her motorcade.

Clinton also attended a series of fundraisers, including one at the home of City Councilman Jose Huizar, who called himself a long-time Clinton supporter.

“Hillary Clinton is by far the most qualified candidate for U.S. president who brings with her a wealth of experience, toughness, tenacity and compassion,” he said.

Tickets for the event were $2,700, the maximum individual contribution under federal law to a candidate seeking a party’s presidential nomination, according to Political Party Time, a website that tracks political fundraisers.

Individuals who have raised $10,000 were designated as co-hosts and were able to have their pictures taken with Clinton. Those raising $27,000 were designated as event hosts and received an invitation to a host reception with Clinton and membership in the Hillary for America Finance Committee.

Clinton was also scheduled to attend a second downtown fundraiser, with tickets also priced at $2,700, with couples donating $5,400 for Clinton’s primary campaign getting a photo with her. Individuals raising $27,000 were designated as event co-hosts and received an invitation to a host reception with Clinton and received membership in the Hillary for America Finance Committee.

Clinton’s Southland swing came amid news that several of her aides have been interviewed by the FBI as part of an investigation into whether classified information was mishandled by Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state. Clinton has denied any wrongdoing and said she would cooperate with federal investigators.

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LOS ANGELES — The two candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for president appeared in Southern California this week appealing to voters as the June 7 primary election nears.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders addressed a large gathering in Lincoln Park in the Lincoln Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles May 23 before attending a rally at Santa Monica High School that evening where he criticized his opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, for not debating again before the California primary.

Sanders said it was “insulting to the people of California — our largest state — that she is not prepared to have a discussion with me about how we address the major crises we face.”

“A number of months ago our campaign and her campaign reached an agreement on a number of debates, including one here in California,” Sanders told the crowd, referring to commitments each campaign agreed to last winter to add debates to a schedule set by the Democratic National Committee.

Jennifer Palmieri, the Clinton campaign’s communications director, said Clinton plans “to compete hard in the remaining primary states, particularly California, while turning our attention to the threat a Donald Trump presidency poses.”

“We believe that Hillary Clinton’s time is best spent campaigning and meeting directly with voters across California and preparing for a general election campaign that will ensure the White House remains in Democratic hands,” Palmieri said.

Sanders began the day emphasizing immigration reform, an end to deportations, protecting voting rights and boosting wages.

“In this country, if you work 40 hours a week, you should not be living in poverty,” Sanders said.

“That is why I was so proud to work with the workers in the fast-food industry who went out on strike from McDonalds and Burger King who stood up and told this nation they cannot make it on the starvation minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. They demanded, and I support a $15 an hour minimum wage — $15 an hour and the right to form a union.”

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton listens to U.S. Rep. Karen Bass during her visit to the Community Coalition headquarters in South Los Angeles May 24.
(Courtesy photo)

Clinton spent May 23 attending a pair of fundraisers here but on May 24 she joined Rep. Karen Bass, D-Los Angeles, in a discussion on foster care in South Los Angeles, then spoke at a boisterous campaign rally at a union headquarters in Commerce.

“We’ve got to get incomes rising,” she told a standing-room-only crowd in Commerce. “We’ve got to get more good jobs. And here’s how we’re going to do it: We’re going to do it by investing — investing in infrastructure, manufacturing, clean energy. Because some country is going be the clean-energy superpower. It’s going to be either Germany, China or us. I want it to be us.”

Clinton said she declined an invitation to debate Sanders in California prior to the June 7 primary, saying she wanted to focus her attention on defeating Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump in the general election.

Speaking of Trump, she told the Commerce rally: “Somebody may come along promising that he can make the economy great without telling you what he would do other than slash taxes,” Clinton said. “Donald Trump’s tax plan was written by a billionaire for billionaires, best as I can tell.”

Sanders moved his campaign east. On May 24 he was in Anaheim and on May 25 he campaigned in Riverside.

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NORWALK — Area voters will cast ballots June 7 in the California Primary Election on a number of races from presidential to congressional and state legislative contests, according to the Los Angeles County Registrar of Voters here.

Polls open at 7 a.m. and close at 8 p.m.

A large turnout is expected because of the hot ongoing debate by presidential candidates Donald Trump, a Republican; and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, both Democrats.

Other key races are for the Fourth and Fifth District seats on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors where Don Knabe and Mike Antonovich are stepping down due to term limits.

Rep. Janice Hahn, D-San Pedro,; and Knabe’s aide, Steve Napolitano, a former member of the Manhattan Beach City Council, are contenders for the non-partisan position along with Ralph Pacheco of Whittier, a member of the board of the Whittier Union High School District.

The Fourth District includes Whittier, Norwalk, Downey, Bellflower and Paramount.

Seven candidates are seeking to replace Antonovich, including Kathryn Barger, his chief deputy from Los Angeles; Elan Carr, a gang prosecutor from Granada Hills; Los Angeles City Councilman Mitch Englander, State Sen. Bob Huff of San Dimas; Rajpal Kahlon, a real estate agent from Pasadena; Billy Malone, a town council member in Altadena; Glendale Mayor Ara Najarian and Darrell Park, a budget specialist from Pasadena.

In the county races, a candidate receiving more than 50 percent of the voter Tuesday will win. If none of them get 50 percent, the top two vote-getters will square off Nov. 8.

Hahn’s decision to run for county supervisor left her 44th Congressional District seat up for grabs.

State Sen. Isadore Hall was one of the first to declare for Hahn’s seat and he quickly drew a crowd that includes Nanette Diaz Barragan, Democrat, an attorney from San Pedro; Christopher Castillo, Republican, a clerk/carpenter from Wilmington; Martha C. Delgadillo, Democrat, a nutrition manager from South Gate; Morris F. Griffin, Democrat, a Los Angeles County maintenance worker from Inglewood; Marcus C. Musante, Democrat, an attorney from Compton; Sylvia Ortiz, Democrat, a business owner from Lynwood; and Armando Sotomayor, Democrat, a volunteer from Long Beach.

The district includes Lynwood and South Gate.

Seeking Hall’s 35th state Senate District seat are former Assemblymen Steven Bradford, a Democrat from Gardena; and Warren Furutani, a Democrat from Wilmington.

Also on the ballot are Compton City Councilman Isaac Galvan, a Democrat; and Charlotte Ann Svolus, a Republican, and a special education teacher from Torrance.

Also hotly contested is the seat of U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer, a Democrat, who is retiring. Top candidates are California Attorney General Kamala Harris, and Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D- Santa Ana, the sister of Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Cerritos.

Three area legislators are unchallenged in the primary and will keep their offices in 2017.

They are Assemblyman Ed Chu, D-South Pasadena, in the 49th Assembly District; Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia, D-Bell Gardens, in the 58th District; and state Sen. Ricardo Lara, D-Long Beach, in the 33rd state Senate District.

In the 34th Congressional District, incumbent Xavier Becerra, D-Los Angeles, is challenged by Adrienne N. Edwards, Democrat, a housing counselorfrom Los Angeles.

Scott M. Adams, an engineer from Lakewood listing no party affiliation, has filed in the 38th Congressional District, challenging Sanchez. Also filing in the 38th District was Republican Ryan Downing, an evangelical from Whittier.

In the 40th Congressional District, Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard, D-Commerce, is being challenged by student Roman G. Gonzalez of Downey. Gonzalez lists no party affiliation.

In area Assembly races, incumbent Ian Calderon, D-Industry; is being challenged by Republican Rita Topilian of Whittier in the 57th Assembly District, in a rematch from 2014.

In the 63rd Assembly District, Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, D-South Gate, is being challenged by Republican Adams J. Miller of Lakewood, a documentary producer.

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CULVER CITY — Touting campaign themes such as preserving Obamacare, ensuring paid family leave and defending women’s rights, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton used a rally at West Los Angeles College Friday to urge supporters to get to the polls next week — as her California race with Democratic opponent Bernie Sanders gets tighter.

“We have to — starting in the California primary on Tuesday — send an unmistakable message we are stronger together, we are going to work together for a better and fairer nation,” Clinton told a cheering crowd at a “Women for Hillary.”

“And that’s why I need all of you to send in those ballots that are sitting on your kitchen counter,” she said. “If all goes well, I will have the great honor as of Tuesday to be the Democratic nominee for president.”

Clinton again took aim at presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, calling him “unprepared” and “unfit to be president,” and saying the nation cannot afford a Trump presidency.

“We have worked too hard for too long,” she said. “We have come too far to let anybody turn us back now and we are going to stand our ground while we seek common ground to solve the problems that face our country, to bring people to together across all the lines that divide us.”

The appearance in Culver City, which was attended by a host of female elected officials and celebrities such as Elizabeth Banks and Sally Field, was the first of four Southern California events on Clinton’s schedule for the day.

She later attended a rally at the Westminster Rose Center, then took part in a conversation with “community leaders” at Crave restaurant, both in Santa Ana, before attending an evening rally at Cal State San Bernardino.

Former President Bill Clinton, meanwhile, also was in the area stumping on behalf of his wife’s campaign, with rallies in Burbank, Pacoima, Woodland Hills and Santa Monica.

Clinton’s rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, Sanders, was campaigning in Northern California, speaking at rallies in Cloverdale and Fairfield and conducting what his campaign called a labor news conference in Berkeley with Robert Reich, a labor secretary during Bill Clinton’s administration.

Presumptive Republican nominee Donald J. Trump was also be in Northern California, speaking at an early afternoon rally in Redding.

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The choice of former President Bill Clinton to give one of the eulogies at Muhammad Ali’s funeral June 10 has rankled more than a few.

Clinton has been lambasted by many blacks for his push of the omnibus crime bill, the wild expansion of the death penalty at the federal level, his gutting of welfare and the demolishing of banking regulations and other initiatives that allegedly resulted in the locking up of and impoverishing of millions of blacks.

However, just suppose it wasn’t Clinton, but Donald Trump who had been asked to give one of the eulogies?

The firestorm would have been cataclysmic. The very idea is not sacrilegious.

Ali and Trump had a long, cordial relationship, though they seemed as far apart as the sun and the moon. In the 1960s, Ali was the outcast black separatist, anti-government activist, nearly imprisoned draft dodger. He was unceremoniously dumped from boxing, dogged every step of the way by a small phalanx of FBI agents and had a government intelligence dossier that was as thick as a telephone book.

He was America’s number one pariah.

At the same time, Trump lived a silver spoon life. He was a young well-to-do white guy, with no declared political interests or activism, who busily worked for his father in his real estate development company and attended the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

When he graduated, it was a given that he was a young privileged white guy whose sights were clearly set on making gobs of money in the real estate and casino and hotel development business. He was the epitome of the American dream.

Though there’s no record of Trump saying anything about Ali’s draft refusal, defiance of the government, and radical black separatist anti-white pronouncements then, it doesn’t take much imagination to think that Trump saw Ali just as many others did. That was as an unpatriotic, white hating, black militant.

The same year the Supreme Court tossed Ali’s conviction on draft evasion in 1971, Trump officially took over the Trump organization and would spend the next three decades wheeling and dealing in the real estate and business world buying and plopping down casinos, hotels and golf courses throughout the country.

Meantime, Ali, often cash strapped and with plenty of debt from the nearly four years he was banned from the ring, had to scramble to make money with big marquee fights against Joe Frazier, Ken Norton and George Foreman.

Though legions hailed Ali for his pugilistic skills and he had many admirers, legions also were not ready to forgive him. To them, he was still a back racist, loud mouth, draft dodger.

But Trump wasn’t among those legions. Trump’s cheerleading of Ali started when he was enthralled with him after watching the first Ali-Frazier fight in 1971. To Trump, Ali was not just a classy and courageous boxer, but a cash cow.

And for someone like Trump who saw boxing as a way to fill up lots of seats at his casinos, Ali was a natural attraction. For a businessman, this was too much to resist. Trump was now firmly on the Ali bandwagon.

In the next decade, Trump threw a birthday party for Ali, gave testimonials at events for him, and shelled out tens of thousands of dollars in donations to Ali’s Arizona-based Muhammad Ali Parkinson Center. Ali reciprocated by giving Trump a couple of humanitarian awards. This was not just the standard run-of-the-mill stuff that businessmen do to burnish their image as charitable good guys and to get a bushel of tax write-offs in the process.

Trump admired Ali as a courageous fighter and solid role model of someone who was reviled but bounced back. Ali in turn seemed to admire Trump for his willingness to reach out and support causes that were near and dear to him, and to actually show that he really cared about him.

Ali was careful to give Trump a big pass when he lashed out at his silly, crude and offensive call to consider banning Muslims from the country. Ali did not mention Trump by name in his criticism. He simply convinced himself that Trump was really referring to “jihadists and extremists,” not all Muslims.

The mutual admiration society that Trump and Ali had for each other was real and heartfelt. Trump was quick in the door in his praise of Ali when news broke of his passing. That was not simply playing to the public and media gate. It was genuine.

The takeaway is not that Trump, the noxious, race- and Muslim-baiting demagogue, and Ali, the socially conscious, much beloved Muslim, could find common ground. It is simply another indication that Ali could bridge the unseemingly unbridgeable gulf between someone who would shamefully use race and religion as a wedge to polarize and divide.

That is a tribute to Ali’s greatness and it’s also testament to Trump’s acknowledgement of that. Yes, he, not Clinton, could have been one of those to eulogize Ali.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His latest book is “How ‘President’ Trump will Govern” (Amazon Kindle). He also is a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on Radio One and the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and the Pacifica Network.

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Muhammad Ali, the boxing legend, activist and humanitarian who made his mark on the world, was truly the “Greatest of All Time.

His death on June 3 from septic shock due to unspecified natural causes left many in mourning across the globe. Ali spent the final hours of his life surrounded by his family after initially being hospitalized in the Phoenix area on June 3.

On a personal note, I was devastated. Ali was the greatest man I’ve ever met in my life. When I embraced Islam 25 years ago and changed my name, I wanted it to be after someone I admired. Jazz saxophonist Najee was my favorite musician. Muhammad Ali was the man I wanted to be like.

My last name is in honor of Ali. As a member of the Muslim community, I eventually met Ali several times and became close friends with several family members. One of the highlights of my life was at our annual Islamic Convention in Chicago. I was walking with Ali to the VIP backstage section with his children and his longtime friend and photographer, Howard Bingham.

I was carrying my infant son with me. Ali looks over at me and extends his arms over. He wanted to hold my son and kiss him.

I handed my son to him as Ali gently held him and kissed him. I’ll never forget that moment. I then continued to escort Ali backstage to meet his longtime friend and my deceased father-in-law, Imam W.D. Mohammed. That was the last time I would ever see Ali alive.

Ali was a devout Muslim, who lived and died as a Muslim. There are some who want to demonize Islam and Muslims. But the Muslim community could always point to Ali as our champion who was the Muslim community’s greatest ambassador.

In the aftermath of the 2001 World Trade Center attacks, Ali said, “What’s really hurting me — the name Islam is involved, and Muslim is involved and causing trouble and starting hate and violence. Islam is not a killer religion, Islam means peace. I couldn’t just sit home and watch people label Muslims as the reason for this problem.”

By no means was Ali perfect, but he was sincere.

What made Ali great was that he had the courage and conviction to stand up for his religious beliefs. When he refused the United States demand that he be enlisted in the military draft he responded with “I ain’t got no quarrel with the Viet Cong. … No Viet Cong ever called me nigger.”

Ali also responded with quotes such as, “Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on brown people in Vietnam while so-called negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights?

“I’m not going 10,000 miles from home to help murder and burn another poor nation simply to continue the domination of white slave masters of the darker people the world over.”

Ali didn’t stop there. He continued his verbal truths with quotes during that time period that included “Cassius Clay is a slave name. I didn’t choose it, and I didn’t want it. I am Muhammad Ali, a free name, and I insist people use it when speaking to me and of me.”

“I am America. I am the part you won’t recognize, but get used to me. Black, confident, cocky. My name, not yours. My religion, not yours. My goals, my own. Get used to me.”

“We were brought here 400 years ago for a job. Why don’t we get out and build our own nation and quit begging for jobs? We’ll never be free until we own our own land. We’re 40 million people and we don’t have two acres that’s truly ours.”

Ali’s militant stand cost him. He was banned from boxing for three years during the prime of his career and lost millions of dollars in boxing and endorsement income until the U.S. Supreme Court overturned his conviction and ruled in his favor.

When Ali returned to boxing with a vengeance, he still never wavered in his blackness. Before Ali’s fight against Jerry Quarry in 1970, he said, “Nobody has to tell me that this is a serious business. I’m not fighting one man. I’m fighting a lot of men, showing a lot of ‘em. Here is one man they couldn’t defeat, couldn’t conquer. My mission is to bring freedom to millions of black people.

“I’m gonna fight for the prestige, not for me, but to uplift my little brothers who are sleeping on concrete floors today in America. Black people who are living on welfare, black people who can’t eat, black people who don’t know no knowledge of themselves, black people who don’t have no future.

“I know I got it made while the masses of black people are catchin’ hell, but as long as they ain’t free, I ain’t free.” Those are just a brief handful of quotes that help make Ali the Great of All Time.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti was among those who chimed in on Ali’s death. The city, he said, was mourning with the fighter’s family.

“Muhammad Ali gave us incredible skill as a fighter, an incomparable gift for words, and a peerless legacy as a sports and cultural icon,” Garcetti said in a statement. “He also modeled the extraordinary power of self-determination — inspiring millions to treasure their humanity, claim their dignity, and give all they have to the global causes of peace, justice and equality. … ‘The Greatest’ is no longer with us in body, but his spirit lives in the hearts of all who were touched by his grace and strength.”

Mayor Garcetti couldn’t have said it better. Maryum May-May Ali the champ’s eldest daughter just know that our prayers go out to you and your entire family. We’ll always love and remember your dad. Muhammad Ali will always be the Greatest of All Time.

As I predicted months ago, it’s now officially Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump. I want to congratulate Bernie Sanders and all his supporters. My heart was with Bernie because I was feeling the Bern. But ultimately my support and vote went to Hillary. She’s more than qualified to get the job done. Let’s unite the Democratic Party and keep the White House.

Congratulations to Van Brown, Mayor Aja Brown, Urban Vision and Cross Connextion, in conjunction with the city of Compton’s My Brother’s Keeper, for helping the city’s male youth. They will be attending a free mentoring overnight summer camp this weekend in the mountains of San Bernardino.

This is a three-day event to help middle school students understand the meaning of manhood. Male students will be mentored in the basic steps to accept responsibility, explore resources and opportunities vital to their success as an emerging young man. Students will gain insight on how their experiences (negative or positive) can be used to create positive change within their personal lives, family, community and future.

In addition to the workshops being provided the camp will provide various youth activities including a giant water slide, bouldering room, zip line, tree climbing, giant swing, mountain biking, rec room, disc golf, arts and crafts, hiking, swimming and a skate park.

Now this is the type of leadership that makes the city of Compton so special. The registration fee was waived by an anonymous donor who enables low-income families and those who registered to attend the camp for free. The mainstream media is always in a rush to cover any negativity concerning the city but we rarely hear of positive stories concerning the city and leaders like Van Brown who are making a positive change in young people lives on a daily basis.

For news tips, email BrotherNajeeali@gmail.com or follow me on Twitter@Najeeali.

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I said from day one that the email flap with Hillary Clinton was much ado about nothing.

The FBI announcement that there will be no criminal charges against Clinton July 5 was pure anti-climax. There weren’t going to be.

Yet, Republican presidential contender Donald Trump was so happy he couldn’t jump high enough when Bill Clinton met briefly with Attorney General Loretta Lynch. This supposedly was irrefutable proof that Lynch, and by extension President Obama and Hillary Clinton, were in cahoots to cook the books on the FBI and Justice Department probe into Hillary’s alleged misuse of State Department related emails.

Trump got what he wanted; namely much GOP lambasting of Bill for alleged deal-making to scuttle the probe, the quick recusal of Lynch from any direct hand in the probe, much chatter that Clinton was shady and a liar, and much media attention to the meeting that Hillary had with the FBI.

The three-hour meeting at FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C. was the icing on the attack Hillary cake. It supposedly was even more proof that Clinton was in real hot water, and maybe, just maybe, there could actually be charges brought against her.

As I said, that was never going to happen. For the simple fact that’s been a fact from the moment the whiff of scandal arose about Clinton’s use of a private server to read and send State Department related emails, there was no wrongdoing involved.

There was never a shred of evidence that Clinton jeopardized national security by the use of her private server. The protocols about the use of a private email server to conduct official government business were tightened after Clinton’s State Department tenure.

However, there is indeed some momentary political fall-out from Bill’s meeting with Lynch.

The fact that Clinton did meet with Lynch at all, no matter what the circumstances and no matter that there wasn’t a word spoken about the probe, gave Trump and the Republican Party more ammunition to plant the seed even deeper in the general public that the Clintons are the personification of sleaze, and that President Obama is anything but a neutral arbiter in the Justice Department probe.

That in turn reinforced the very widespread notion that Clinton is prone to shade the truth about embarrassing or compromising issues. That all comes on top of incessant polls that practically join Hillary at the hip with Trump as the two presidential candidates who have the highest negatives in living presidential memory.

The presidential campaign is fast getting the moniker of the race to the bottom and the impression that if Clinton wins, it won’t be about her sterling political competence, qualities, leadership, experience and acumen, just that fewer people held their noses about her than Trump.

The Bill-Lynch meeting was also a case of horrible timing. It came days after the report on the Benghazi debacle that found that Clinton had no culpability in and for the attack. That seemed to presage the expectation that the same finding would be made with the email flap. The probe would find nothing on Clinton.

Bill’s meeting with Lynch hitting the news cycle hard drowned that notion out at least for the moment.

Then there’s the recent polls. Trump’s stock has been going south in most polls. And virtually every time he lets fly a fresh zinger about firing TSA employees with hijabs, slandering a Mexican judge, or tweeting with an anti-Semitic construed emblem about Hillary, this knocks another point or two off his popularity.

That makes the anti-Trump panic among many GOP party regulars and potential donors and handlers soar higher. So, for the moment, Bill’s meeting and the FBI interview seemed to offer welcome pause in the downhill run for Trump.

The single slender thread that Trump clings to about the email probe is that Clinton is indicted in the days before the election. That won’t happen. But it won’t stop Trump from dropping strong hints every chance he gets that it should happen and if it doesn’t, he’ll circle back and plop the blame for this on the alleged collusion to kill charges by variously, Bill, Hillary, Obama and Lynch.

The great pity is that the continued GOP, media and public obsession with Clinton’s emails at times blur, ignore and flat out dodge any real talk about tax reform, job growth and the economy, health care, wealth and income inequality, civil rights, environmental concerns and criminal justice reforms. These are the issues that any election should be about, and what the media and the public should care about.

Bernie Sanders famously said at one of the early debates with Clinton that he was sick and tired of hearing about the damn emails and said the only thing that should be on the table for debate and discussion were the real issues. He got loud cheers from the mostly Democratic audience for telling the truth.

There was never much chance though that the email scandal would fade to the non-issue that it is and should be. But Bill notwithstanding, whenever it’s dredged up it’s still much ado about nothing.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He is the author of “Let’s Stop Denying Made in America Terrorism” (Amazon Kindle). He also is a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on Radio One and the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and the Pacifica Network.

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The Republican National Convention — also known as the Republican clown show — began this week in Cleveland.

As you listen to Donald Trump’s supporters explain why they like him, you inevitably hear one phrase over and over: “He tells it like it is.”

Actually, he doesn’t. What he does is tell it like he feels or like he wants it be. And his perceptions rarely coincide with verifiable truth or even plausible possibility.

He nicknamed one of his GOP rivals “Lyin’ Ted,” but even the notoriously dishonest Texas senator is not quite as bad as Trump. The respected website PolitiFact has rated only 11 percent of Trump’s statements “true” or “mostly true,” compared with 22 percent for Ted Cruz. The woman some Republicans refer to as “Hil-liar-y,” by contrast, is accurate 51 percent of the time.

What Trump’s voters are responding to is not his fearless veracity but an incurable willingness to say whatever pops into his head, even if — or especially if — it’s likely to offend someone. He does “tell it like it is” in the sense that he doesn’t let conventions, good manners or discretion inhibit him in the least. But you can be blunt by saying an American-born Hispanic judge is a “Mexican,” for instance and still be wrong in 2016.

Trump’s abrasive candor is one reason some people assume he’s more honest than Clinton. She is obsessively careful when she speaks, which makes her sound calculating and evasive, even when what she says is true.

But anyone who relies on Trump’s words to represent reality is sure to be unpleasantly surprised. A story in the New York Times on his business record concluded that “based on the mountain of court records churned out over the span of Mr. Trump’s career, it is hard to find a project he touched that did not produce allegations of broken promises, blatant lies or outright fraud.”

Broken promises, blatant lies and outright fraud are not failures in his formula for business and politics. They are the formula.

Broken promises, blatant lies and outright fraud are not failures in his formula for business and politics. They are the formula. I will not vote for Trump under any circumstances. I hope you won’t either.

The former Compton school board member who committed an unwanted sex act on a sleeping man in a San Diego hotel room was sentenced last week to six years in prison.

Skyy De’Anthony Fisher, 33, was convicted of the crime in late January, but his sentencing hearing was delayed when he changed lawyers and filed a motion for a new trial.

After hearing more than two hours of testimony July 14, San Diego Superior Court Judge Runston Maino denied that motion and sentenced Fisher to the middle term available under state law.

Fisher could have received a sentence ranging from probation, with little or no additional jail time, up to eight years in prison.

“I can’t grant probation in this type of case,” Judge Maino said after hearing arguments from the attorneys. “I think the victim was [particularly] vulnerable. He was sleeping. He had been drinking. The emotional injury on this victim, I think, has been profound.”

One of the most shocking developments in this case was the strong support Fisher received from local  activist Jasmyne Cannick, who went around the entire city lying to elected officials and members of the media proclaiming that Fisher was in a relationship with the student, when she knew better.

I will never forget the day when community residents and activists Arturo Flores, Pastor K.W.Tulloss, Donyetta Hamm, Big Money Griff and several parents were confronted by Cannick as she yelled at them for protesting against Fisher and she kept defending Fisher until the very end. I want to personally commend my fellow activists who always stood up and had the courage to demand justice for the victim and didn’t want someone like Fisher around their children.

According to testimony presented at the January trial, Fisher and the victim had known each other about a year before they made the trip from Los Angeles County to San Diego two years ago. Fisher was described as a mentor to the younger man, who was a college student at the time.

In San Diego, they went to bars with friends in the Gaslamp Quarter before returning to a hotel early the morning of April 5, 2014. The two men shared a room at the Keating Hotel on F Street, but had separate beds.

The victim testified he woke up in bed about 7:30 a.m. and found Fisher performing oral sex on him. Before the man could say anything, Fisher stopped and jumped back onto the other bed and pretended to be asleep. The younger man got angry, gathered his belongings and left the room.

A short time later, the two men had a confrontation outside the hotel, and the victim punched Fisher before driving away and calling 911. Evidence was collected from his body during a sexual assault response team examination later that morning and Fisher’s DNA was found. A jury took less than 45 minutes to return a verdict.

Deputy District Attorney Lisa Fox argued during the sentencing hearing that prison was appropriate, given the impact Fisher’s actions had on a young man who had trusted him.

“You were supposed to be a friend, a representative of the city and most of all the youth…,” the man wrote in a letter read aloud in court by the prosecutor. “I have been in prison emotionally and mentally because of your selfish act.”

Upon his release from prison, Fisher will have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.

For news tips, email BrotherNajeeali@gmail.com or follow me on Twitter@Najeeali.

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Here are some key dates in presidential history, politics and elections that tell much about why the wanton murder of three police officers in Baton Rouge could loom big in 2016.

The dates are 1964, 1968, 1980, 1992, 2001 and 2008.

In 1964, Republican presidential contender Barry Goldwater ran hard on an unabashed state’s right, anti-civil rights stance as he relentlessly savaged social programs. He was crushed in the November election by Lyndon Johnson, but he won a victory of another sort.

He made conservatism a powerful force in American politics. That transformed the Republican Party and presidential politics for decades to come. It eventually even pushed the Democratic Party to the right.

In 1968, Republican presidential contender Richard Nixon, snatched Goldwater’s line, reshaping it into his Southern Strategy. That translated out to say and do as little about civil rights while painting a nightmarish vision of anarchy in the streets from the urban riots and campus upheavals of the day.

He spiced that up by cloaking himself firmly in the mantle of the tough guy, law-and-order candidate. It worked. He not only won, but made the Southern Strategy a staple in the playbook of subsequent Republican presidential candidates.

In 1980, GOP presidential candidate Ronald Reagan finger-pointed President Jimmy Carter for his supposed abysmal failure to free the American hostages in the Iranian takeover of the American embassy. That was a major tipping point for the election and Reagan.

In 1992, Democratic presidential contender Bill Clinton rode the mass public fear and anger over the L.A. riots by outflanking President George H.W. Bush on the GOP’s formula law and order issue, and promised, if elected, to put 100,000 more police on the streets. He, not Bush, was seen as the guy who could best handle urban unrest in the White House.

In 2001, the mass 9/11 terror attack instantly rescued George W. Bush from plunging popularity ratings and the public perception of his and his administration as failed, flawed and bungled. He shaped the image of himself as the president who could best handle any and all present and future terror attacks.

In 2008, terror was no longer the public’s obsession, but a failed, flawed Iraq War, an economy in free fall, and a potential financial collapse were. Though Bush was not running, the blame for this fell on the head of the GOP and its presidential candidate, John McCain. It was just enough to seal the White House for a first-=term junior senator from Illinois and an African-American.

In 2016, there’s Baton Rouge, and before that the murder of five police officers in Dallas and the Nice terror attack. Taken together, they are crises that stoke anger, fear, insecurity, mania and a heightened, even desperate, search for the proverbial man on the white horse to reassure that the person in the White House will be hard-nosed on law, order and security.

Donald Trump will pull out all stops to make sure that when Baton Rouge is mentioned, he will be the only name that many voters, jittery and angry over the heinous killing and terror attacks, will reflexively think of. He took the first giant step in that direction by pilfering the line from Nixon’s presidential script and branding himself as the “law and order candidate.”

There is some evidence that it has some resonance. Polls showed that after the Dallas massacre, Trump had inched up on Clinton in the three states that will do much too decide the White House, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida.

Baton Rouge simply doubles down on the possibility of another poll bump up for Trump. That’s not all that’s deeply worrisome.

There’s a historic parallel that gives an ominous cast to public sentiment about the always volatile impact of racial politics on an election. The civil rights movement in the mid-1960s firmly staked out the moral high ground for a powerful and irresistible movement for racial justice. It was classic good versus evil.

Many white Americans were sickened by the gory news scenes of baton-battering racist Southern sheriffs, fire hoses, police dogs, and Klan violence unleashed against peaceful black protesters. Racial segregation was considered by just about anyone and everyone who fancied themselves as decent Americans as immoral and indefensible, and the civil rights leaders were hailed as martyrs and heroes in the fight for justice.

The civil rights movement had the sympathy and goodwill of millions of whites, politicians and business leaders during those years. As America unraveled in the 1960s in the anarchy of urban riots, campus takeovers and anti-war street battles, public attitudes toward civil rights hardened and it played out in national politics.

The polarization has steadily deepened. The backlash against affirmative action, expanded civil rights protections and voting rights, and the relentless rip of Black Lives Matter and President Barack Obama for supposedly creating a climate for the murder of cops is a prime case of that. Trump swims in the climate of the open hostility and contempt of many toward Democrats.

He will do even more to stir those waters. All it takes is one or two more Baton Rouge type instances of mayhem and murder in the days before the election to be a game changer that could elect Trump. Heaven forbid that not another presidential election hinges on a disaster.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He is the author of “Let’s Stop Denying Made in America Terrorism,” (Amazon Kindle). He is a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on Radio One and the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and the Pacifica Network.

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LOS ANGELES — The father of former Los Angeles High School football star who was gunned down by a gang member living in this country illegally used a 3 1/2-minute speech at the Republican National Convention July 18 to praise presumptive presidential nominee Donald J. Trump’s support of ending illegal immigration.

After recounting how his 17-year-old son, Jamiel Shaw II was killed in 2008, Jamiel Shaw said “only Trump called me on the phone one day to see how I was doing.”

“Only Trump will stand against terrorists and end illegal immigration,” Shaw said, drawing cheers from delegates at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland. The convention closed July 21 with trump formally accepting the Republican Party’s nomination for president.

“Only Trump mentions Americans killed by illegals. Trump will put America first, not crooked Hillary,” Shaw said, using the derisive nickname for presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton often used by Trump.

Shaw’s speech followed another address by a Southern Californian with a child killed by a man living in the country illegally.

The son of Sabine Durden of Moreno Valley was killed in 2012 at the age of 30 in a collision with a Chevrolet pickup truck driven by an unlicensed driver who was in the country illegally.

Clinton has said that immigration enforcement must be humane, targeted and effective. She has pledged that as president, she would focus resources on detaining and deporting those individuals who pose a violent threat to public safety.

Shaw has spoken at previous events featuring Trump. At a Trump rally in Costa Mesa in April, Shaw said that when he saw television coverage of Trump announcing his candidacy on June 16, 2015, “for the first time, it gave me real hope.”

Shaw also stood next to Trump at a July 10, 2015 news conference in Beverly Hills. Trump asked Shaw if his rhetoric was racist. Shaw replied, “It’s not racist. What he’s doing is he’s speaking for the dead. He’s speaking for my son.”

Jamiel Shaw II was shot and killed in 2008 near his Arlington Heights home by a gang member who prosecutors said mistakenly perceived him as a gang rival because he was carrying a red Spider-Man backpack.

Shaw was a star running back at Los Angeles High School and the Southern League most valuable player in 2007. He had been contacted by Stanford and Rutgers about continuing his football career at the time of his death.

Pedro Espinoza, convicted of first-degree murder in 2012 and sentenced to death for killing Shaw, was living in the United States illegally at the time of the killing.

He had been freed from jail two days before the shooting without immigration authorities placing a hold on him.

Trump said in 2015 that the younger Shaw was “shot from nowhere by an illegal who shouldn’t have been in the country, and nobody wants to talk about it. … The system is really screwed up.”

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It is certainly true that when Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump shouts repeatedly that he is the “law and order candidate,” he is simply pilfering the line and pitch that would-be presidential candidates George Wallace, Barry Goldwater, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton worked to death during their White House bids.

It also has been amply established that the law and order line is top heavy with wink and nod racially loaded code visions of rampant black crime, and this is a sure fire method of pandering for votes from fearful suburban whites.

But Trump actually has his own history separate and apart from presidential racial scare politics of being a self-styled tough guy on crime. The start point was the now infamous Central Park Five case in 1989.

The five were young African-American and Latino youths charged with the rape and beating of a white female jogger in New York’s Central Park. They were convicted and imprisoned for more than a decade. The five were innocent. Their alleged confessions were obtained illegally through two days of non-stop police intimidation, coercion and lies.

There was no physical evidence to connect them to the crime. The actual assailant eventually confessed and the city settled a multimillion wrongful imprisonment lawsuit with the five.

Trump sniffed an inflammatory opening with the case. With much fanfare when the case hit the news, he shelled out $85,000 to four newspapers to splash an ad demanding the death penalty for the five.

Trump made clear that he was not just outraged over the brutal rape and assault but that the case typified a city under siege from lawlessness and that it was time to crack down. The heavy-handed wielding of the death penalty was the only way to send the get tough message to criminals.

He minced no words in his ad. “I want to hate these muggers and murderers.”

The ad was a not so subtle effort to prod state legislators to override then New York Gov. Mario Cuomo’s annual veto of a proposed law to reinstate the death penalty in the state.

Trump did not budge one inch from his tough guy stance on crime even after the admission that the Central Park Five were innocent. There were no apologies, no recriminations, no second guesses from him about the horror that if New York had had the death penalty at the time and the five men had been executed at his prodding, that he would have had the blood of innocent men on his hands.

Instead, he doubled down and lambasted the city’s pay-out to the men as a disgrace and politics at its lowest form. The bald implication was that the men were still guilty and got a reward for their crime.

Trump returned to his death penalty tout again last December when he screamed at a meeting of the New England Police Benevolent Association that one of the first things that he would do if elected would be to sign an executive order urging judges and juries to automatically slap the death penalty on anyone who kills a cop.

It was pure hyperbole since only states can apply the death penalty for the murder of local police and the federal government has jurisdiction over the death penalty in a limited number of proscribed federal cases. But Trump wasn’t finished.

He solemnly pledged that he would never let police officers down and that he would do everything he could to get the police even more military-style equipment and vehicles. That was an obvious slap at the increasing call by many civil rights and civil liberties advocates and even a promise by President Barack Obama to review the heavy duty surplus military armor and weapons that police departments have gotten free or at bargain basement prices from the Defense Department.

Trump masterfully played to the law and order crowd with the death penalty and further militarization of police departments to make the political point that he was the candidate who would crack down on crime and violence. He got the full-throated backing of the New England police group.

The San Bernardino massacre and the murder of police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge are simply the horrid backdrop to the line that Trump has honed over time about America supposedly under siege from lawlessness in the streets and the need for someone to say it is time to do whatever it takes to stop it.

Trump didn’t need Wallace or Nixon to know that the law and order pitch can potentially pay rich political dividends. He first touched a nerve with it in New York decades ago and he will play hard on it again and again in the fall, again painting a picture of streets in anarchy, while tarring Clinton and the Democrats as softies on crime. It’s a scare tactic he is no stranger to.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He is the author of “Let’s Stop Denying Made in America Terrorism,” (Amazon Kindle). He is a weekly co-host of the Al Sharpton Show on Radio One and the host of the weekly Hutchinson Report on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles and the Pacifica Network.

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