In Detroit, why there is no Black Democrat on the ballot for Congress

On a recent sunny Saturday afternoon in a neighborhood park in the middle of this sprawling city, residents were dributing free backpacks for students heading back to school. Girls sat patiently under a pop-up tent to get their hair braided, while other children gleefully leaped and collided in an inflated bounce castle.
One person stood out in the mostly African American crowd: a slim, 67-year-old Indian immigrant in a white T-shirt and dark pants, hopping from tent to tent and chatting with parents and neighbors, who seemed excited to see him.
The man, state Rep. Shri Thanedar, had beaten eight Black candidates in a primary to become the Democratic candidate for Michigan’s 13th Congressional Drict — meaning that for the first time in almost 70 years, the nation’s largest majority Black city is unlikely to have a Black representative in Congress.
His victory set off waves of anxiety among Detroit’s Black political leaders, who tried desperately to prevent Thanedar from winning. (A primary win in such a heavily Democratic drict is tantamount to being elected.) Black leaders describe it as “embarrassing” and “disappointing,” and argue that Detroit should have representation that reflects its population, which is 77% Black. Three-quarters of Detroit voters supported a Black candidate.
The outcome is also testing the limits of racial representation in a city with a long tradition of Black political power — at a time when that power is being challenged and drained on other fronts. In Los Angeles, the City Council was recently shaken the release of secret recordings of rac remarks and efforts Latino leaders to shrink Black influence in the city.
Detroit began sending two Black delegates to Congress in the 1960s, and elected its first Black mayor in 1973. the 1980s, Black membership and status in the state legislature was rising, and half the City Council was Black.
Now, the challenge to Black political power in Detroit comes from divisions within its own leadership and from constituents. Reapportionment cost Michigan a House seat last year, and the newly redrawn drict maps reduced the number of Black voters in the 13th Drict. After years of severe economic insecurity and a string of political scandals, some residents are showing a willingness to try something new.

In 2013, Detroit elected Mike Duggan, its first white mayor since the 1970s — the same year that a former mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, was convicted of charges including racketeering and extortion. Five years later, Rashida Tlaib became the first woman of Palestinian descent to be elected to Congress, when she won the seat once occupied John Conyers Jr. — a towering figure in Detroit politics who resigned over sexual harassment allegations.
Those victories and Thanedar’s point to an emerging sense among some Black constituents that the psychic, emotional and symbolic benefits of racial representation may not have materially improved their lives.
“Well, let’s go back years and years and years, and see that when we had those people in office, they all didn’t meet up to what they said they met up to,” said Kimball Gaskinsel, a 58-year-old Black man who helped organize the backpack giveaway in the park. He said of Thanedar, “Let’s give the man a chance.”
Detroit’s population has fallen more than 1 million since 1950, and for decades, its leaders have been promising a renaissance. Since emerging from bankruptcy in 2014, the city’s core has managed an impressive revival: Its downtown sparkles with new restaurants, shops and hotels. But Detroit’s comeback is limited and uneven, highlighting racial and economic disparities that have long frustrated residents.
Between 2010 and 2020 the city lost about 93,000 Black residents, many of whom departed for metro area suburbs, while gaining slightly more Asian and white residents, and people who identify more than one race.
In 2021, the unemployment rate among Black residents of Detroit was 20%, compared with 11% among white residents, according to research based on census data. The median Black household earned a little less than $35,000, when rising rents and inflation began to eat into family budgets.
“It kind of irritates me to see downtown being built up and the neighborhoods being neglected,” said M. Lewis Bass, a 71-year old tenant organizer.
Bass, who is Black, voted for Thanedar in the primary. He said he liked Thanedar’s tendency to pop up at community events. “It shows a genuine interest in the citizen,” he said. Bass expressed hope that Thanedar would work to curb landlord power and address rising rents and evictions.
Other Detroiters say that residents will be worse off. “It’s disgusting” for the city to be without a Black representative, said Stevetta Johnson, 73. A retired social worker who leads the Trade Union Leadership Council, Johnson said she was concerned that a representative of another race wouldn’t look out for Black Detroiters when it comes to bringing money and resources into the city.
On the surface, Thanedar, who arrived in the United States in 1979 and later started a successful chemical business, might seem to be an unlikely politician to represent the newly redrawn 13th Drict, whose population is now 45% Black.
He is a wealthy man who lived in Ann Arbor before moving to Detroit three years ago. He spent $10.6 million of his own money on an unsuccessful run for governor in 2018, and he has so far spent around $6 million from his own pocket on his congressional campaign.
Activs and voters in the drict’s poor and working-class neighborhoods point to how Thanedar seems to show up everywhere — at jazz concerts, at tenant meetings — repeatedly, and sometimes unannounced.
At the backpack giveaway, Thanedar told a mostly Black audience that students deserve a quality education “no matter what ZIP code they live in,” because “we are all children of the same God.” He encouraged voters to hold him to his promises. “You can have my cellphone number,” he said. “Call me.”
He ended his talk with, “I love you all.” The small crowd erupted in applause.
Thanedar often reminds Detroit voters of his humble beginnings. He said he wants to increase Black entrepreneurship, close the racial wealth gap and improve the quality of education.
For Leslie Ford, 50, a born and raised Black Detroiter who runs a nonprofit group, racial representation isn’t much of a concern. “It’s all about the person that’s showing that they care for real,” she said.
Thanedar’s supporters say that financing his campaign himself shows how much he cares, and that he isn’t beholden to special interests. “He did everything with his own money,” Ford said.
Political observers say that many factors contributed to Thanedar’s victory. The drict’s newly drawn boundaries take in some whiter, more conservative communities outside Detroit. Low voter turnout and a crowded primary allowed Thanedar to squeak through with just 28% of the ballots cast. Even so, political leaders say ignoring Thanedar’s ability to appeal to Black voters would be a make.
“I don’t think we can say, ‘Next time, if it’s just one Black person and Shri, it’ll be different,’ said Portia Roberson, a former Obama adminration Justice Department official who lost to Thanedar in the primary. “I think that’s naive on our part.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.