We Should Listen to Rev Barber on White Poverty and Multracial Organizing

For progressives to win, we need a powerful multiracial coalition. That includes the people of color who disproportionately suffer poverty and structural violence, but it also includes the white people who make up the largest share of poor people in this country.

As the Reverend Dr. William J. Barber II points out in his new book, White Poverty, there are more poor white people than any other racial group, and more effort should be put into pulling them into this coalition.

I'm a white man from a wealthy family—and a lawyer who took on tough civil rights cases and fought them as if my life depended on it. My goal from the beginning was to join those who are trying to make America a better place—a country where racism and sexism would slowly fade away and where the possibility of equal opportunity would shine through.

I see that road forward in Rev. Barber's new book, co-written with Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove.

White Poverty's great value is to teach and motivate both Black and white leaders to create a multiracial movement which demands legislation that benefits all poor people.

Talking to white people in all walks of life—from taxi drivers to restaurant workers as well as bankers and stockbrokers—has been very revealing. When I say I'm a civil rights lawyer, their voices often take on a certain unsympathetic tone—and many times they inject the "Black crime rate" into the conversation. Sometimes the person will shift the conversation to discuss Black children being raised by single women who use food stamps to put food on the table or who benefit from other welfare programs.

As Barber points out, there are "more than twice as many poor white people as there are poor Black people in this nation." But if I mention that, the person sometimes appears not to hear me, or lets me know in no uncertain terms that it's Black people themselves who are at fault for their poverty—and they should look to their own lives rather than blame whites. The government taxes "us," I'm often told, to give "them" a free ride.

When I hear this, I know there's something major missing.

De-racializing Poverty

I've been encouraged by the many articles, books, and memoirs that have been written about racial justice since the protests over George Floyd's murder, but few suggest an effective way forward.

For example, a new book by Kellie Carter Jackson, We Refuse: A Forceful History of Black Resistance (Seal Press, 2024), highlights how Black women fought back against racism, some with weapons, some without, but none took the path that Reverend Barber takes in White Poverty. Reverend Barber, by contrast, argues that Blacks and whites must join together to address their common needs.

Another prominent civil rights advocate, Heather McGhee, traveled across America to write The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together (One World, 2021), which documents how some progressives were beginning to engage in cross-racial solidarity through collective action to achieve higher wages and benefits for working people.

As Barber points out, the political establishment invariably markets itself to the needs of "the middle class" and ignores the poor, and whites especially look the other way.

In effect, Barber's White Poverty builds upon McGhee's book. It's the work of a man of action to not only test cross-racial solidarity, but to put that theory into action. Barber lays it on the line in his very first sentence: "This is a book by a Black man about white poverty in America." That initial signal points to where he is headed.

As a lifelong civil rights lawyer, I find that his signal resonates. As Barber persuasively argues, the public and the country's legislatures—federal, state, and local—accept the myth that poverty is only a Black issue, as do the people I talk to daily. They view poverty through this lens to the detriment of Black and white people alike, as well as people of all other colors and races.

As Barber points out, the political establishment invariably markets itself to the needs of "the middle class" and ignores the poor, and whites especially look the other way. The same is true even in our country's religious establishments. Barber notes that "a Pew Research Center study of nearly 50,000 sermons found that neither the words 'poverty' nor 'poor' register as commonly used in American pulpits."

A Multiracial Fusion Movement

Much of White Poverty concerns the history of how American racism came into being and how the myths evolved around it. Barber explains how the manipulation of these myths has preserved the power of white elites, who use their political and economic power to downgrade the needs of poor white people as well as Black people, while benefiting the wealthy.

To this reader then, White Poverty's great value is to teach and motivate both Black and white leaders to create a multiracial movement which demands legislation that benefits all poor people. As an additional benefit, White Poverty gives examples of Black and white movements fusing themselves together.

Not least, Barber has spent a huge amount of energy over the past seven years in building a multiracial Poor People's Campaign. Co-chaired by Rev. Barber along with Rev. Liz Theoharis of the Kairos Center, the Poor People's Campaign has thousands in the field to help poor white and poor Black communities understand each others' community needs and the advantages of working together to fight against "policy violence" and to turn out the vote.

This beautifully written book offers a road map to the powerful multiracial organizing that can turn this country around, lift up poor people, and deepen our democracy.

In the last election for governor in Kentucky, the campaign and its allies worked with both white and Black rural communities to get out the vote. The result was an upset in electing the state's present governor, Democrat Andy Beshear. In rural counties, an enlarged electorate turned out to vote and that tipped the election.

The Poor People's Campaign has built durable alliances with other organizations to advance its multiracial vision. It's currently collaborating with the AFL-CIO on voter engagement. It pursues legal challenges with Forward Justice. It coordinates actions with national Christian and Jewish organizations. With the Institute for Policy Studies, on whose board I serve, it has produced the data and the analysis to back up its bold agenda.

Barber is a man of the cloth who takes his religion seriously. As a result, the book is sprinkled with words from other religious figures who offer moral reasons for organizing poor people to struggle for their needs nonviolently but willing to cross police lines and stand up to authority.

In short, this beautifully written book offers a road map to the powerful multiracial organizing that can turn this country around, lift up poor people, and deepen our democracy.