Obama counts on Virginia’s black voters

I'm sure this is part of the general strategy, to get as much of the "minority" vote out as possible:

African-Americans overwhelmingly support Obama's re-election bid this year despite his three often rocky years in office and lingering economic problems. Polls show 90 percent or more of black voters supporting the president over Republican Mitt Romney. Indeed, minority support for Obama is so substantial that his campaign is reportedly projecting that he can win with as little as 40 percent of the white vote.

But there is a lingering question:

Black voters like Williams turned out in historically high numbers four years ago to help make Obama the nation's first African-American president. In Virginia alone, 200,000 more black voters went to the polls in 2008 than turned out in 2004 for Democrat John Kerry, for a jump of nearly 44 percent that made Obama the first Democratic presidential contender to win Virginia in nearly 50 years.

The story was the same in other battleground states. Turnout among blacks increased at a far greater pace in 2008 than it did among white voters in key states like Colorado, Florida and Nevada, and almost all of that black support -- 95 percent -- went to Obama.

Will Obama have the turnout that benefited him four years ago? More quotes:

But the bigger question for Obama, as Williams wondered, is whether African-Americans and other minority groups hit particularly hard by the recession will turn out this fall in the same numbers as 2008, particularly in must-win Virginia and a handful of other swing states that could well decide the race.

"[Black voters'] identity was a motivating factor in getting people who otherwise wouldn't vote to the polls because they wanted to be a part of it" in 2008, said Jan Leighley, an American University expert on race and voting patterns. "What's different this year is with the economy, and as much as the white population is unhappy about their economic fortunes, African-Americans are probably hurt more."

It is noted in this article that Obama will speak to more Black audiences during the course of the campaign. One can only wonder how this strategy will pan out!

Via Instapundit who referred to this as "racialist politics".