Politics
Titans of St. Pete’s Black community Cedric Gordon and Al White back Charlie Crist for Mayor
Retired law enforcement leaders Cedric Gordon and Al White — titans of the Black community known for influencing votes — are backing former Gov. Charlie Crist in his campaign for St. Petersburg Mayor.
Gordon and White each served more than 33 years with the St. Petersburg Police Department, with Gordon rising to the rank of Assistant Police Chief and White to Sergeant. The two were hired together and retired together, in 2013.
The Tampa Bay Times described Gordon and White as the most important public safety leaders in the city’s Black community, writing that “activists and leaders in the city’s African-American community knew exactly who to call if they had an issue with crime or public safety. Cedric Gordon or Al White. Sometimes both.”
Upon their retirement, then-St. Petersburg NAACP President Manuel Sykes praised both Gordon and White as bright spots in St. Pete law enforcement at a time when “we’ve had few Blacks who have risen to the ranks where they can have decisionmaking or policymaking influence.”
“For decades, Chief Gordon and Sgt. White bravely served our city. In and out of uniform, they were pillars of our community. To earn their support means a great deal to me,” Crist said.
First hired in 1980 by then-Police Chief Goliath Davis, Gordon and White have since become something of a political operation unto themselves. Both were part of former Mayor Rick Baker’s political circle and helped Baker — a White Republican — become one of the most beloved city leaders in the Black community despite what might otherwise be described as significant political differences.
The endorsements could be a big boon to Crist, who is challenging incumbent Ken Welch, the city’s first Black Mayor.
Polling shows Crist’s support surging among Black voters. A post-Primary poll earlier this month showed Crist leading Welch 52% to 27%, with demographic breakdowns showing Crist all but erasing Welch’s advantage among Black voters.
As of late July, when a previous St. Pete Polls survey was taken ahead of the Primary, Welch led Crist among Black voters by 26 percentage points. The new poll — the first taken since the Primary, in which Crist finished nearly 15 points ahead of Welch — shows Crist leading Welch among Black voters by 1 percentage point.
While that is well within the poll’s margin of error (4.3 percentage points overall, and considerably wider for a subsample of 86 Black voters), it shows a 27-point swing for Crist among Welch’s strongest demographic.
Welch’s poor showing in the poll is likely a result of his approval rating, which is vastly underwater, at minus 25. The poll found just 24% of voters approve of Welch’s job performance, compared with 49% who disapprove. That’s a sharp drop since polling in late March, when he had a net-positive approval rating of 7 points. In late June, Welch was underwater by 5 points.
The endorsements mean more bad news piling up for Welch. His campaign and political committee coffers are running dry, with less than $25,000 on hand between the two accounts. Crist, meanwhile, has nearly $383,000 still on hand, as of the most recent campaign finance reports.
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