Democratic candidates are gearing up to secure the Black vote in the upcoming 2020 presidential election. Former mayor of New York City and presidential hopeful, Mike Bloomberg is among those rolling out initiatives and reform plans aimed at empowering and supporting Black businesses and entrepreneurship.
According to Black Enterprise Bloomberg announced his Greenwood Initiative: Economic Justice For Black America plan during MLK weekend. The plan is named after the Greenwood community located in Tulsa, Oklahoma which was the home of Black WallStreet, a thriving early 20th-century community of Black businesses and entrepreneurs. According to Bloomberg’s official campaign site, the Greenwood plan promises to create 100,000 new Black-owned businesses and one million new Black homeowners over the next decade.
The details of the Greenwood plan are to increase Black businesses by providing one-stop shops for entrepreneurs, increasing incubators, strengthening Black-owned banks, and increasing access to funding. The official site also highlights the focus of the Greenwood plan to include an emphasis on Black female entrepreneurs.
According to Black Enterprise, Bloomberg told Greenwood’s Vernon Chapel AME Church congregation that he only recently became aware of the 1921 Black Wall Street Massacre and believes it is the job of the next president to address economic injustices in America.
“I do believe the next president has to make the issue of economic inequality a top priority, and there’s no better place for me to talk about it than right here in Greenwood,” Bloomberg told the congregation of Greenwood’s Vernon Chapel AME Church.
Bloomberg’s poll numbers increased to ten percent nationally according to a Morning Consult report placing him in front of Pete Buttigieg, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Tom Steyer, and Andrew Yang.
