Why the next black president could be a Republican

Hood and McKee also found that “white conservatives are either more supportive of minority Republicans or just as likely to vote for a minority as they are a white Republican,” and that “the base of the GOP does not discriminate against minority nominees in high-profile contemporary general elections.” This finding helps explain the relative surge in black Republicans in Congress since the tea party movement, including Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.) and Reps. Mia Love (Utah), Will Hurd (Tex.) and Allen West (Fla.) — not to mention Indian American former governors Nikki Haley (S.C.) and Bobby Jindal (La.).

This phenomenon also can provide an advantage to black candidates in primaries and the general election. In Republican primaries, voters are overwhelmingly white and are becoming more conservative; they tend to choose the more conservative candidate. Understanding this, minority candidates often run to the right flank. It’s unsurprising, then, that Heritage Action for America, an advocacy organization associated with the conservative Heritage Foundation, scored Scott, Love and West as more conservative than the average House Republican. (Hurd, who represents a purple district that is majority Latino, necessarily tacks more to the center.)