All Rev'd Up: Outcome Of Boston's Preliminary Mayoral Election Upholds The "Status Quo"

Revs. Irene Monroe and Emmett G. Price III joined Boston Public Radio on Monday, calling the outcome of Boston’s preliminary mayoral election a prime example of racial dynamics and nuance within the city.

“It’s too simple to suggest that we had these Black women, this Black man. ... The notion of Blackness in Boston is extremely complicated,” Price said. “So once you invoke the notion of being Cape Verdean, and you invoke the notion of different Jamaican and Haitian populations, Boston’s a very strange place in the way that we still identify as, quote unquote, Black and white, when there are many views and many different nuances within that.”

Monroe, meanwhile, suggested that some white liberals failed to follow through with their initial hopes of advancing a Black mayoral candidate to the next round.

“We know that white liberals will talk the talk but not walk the walk here,” Monroe said. “I mean, while you can get Blacks to come out, you also got to get whites to come out. What I’m sad about is that the Black political power that all three of them had, now we lose it because they go back to civilian life.”

“My argument is that even if you dropped out one of the candidates — it seems like a lot of white progressives like Campbell over Janey — they wouldn’t have come out,” she added. “So let’s be honest about what it is: we want to keep it white, but liberals want to do it on the down low. And then your more conservatives just don’t show up.”

In the case of Boston City Councilor Michelle Wu, Monroe expressed concern over whether she would maintain her lead come election day.

“She’s aligned with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, and we know how our state didn’t give her the number one vote when she was running for president,” Monroe said. “Let’s be clear about the anti-Asian sentiment that is still here.”

Monroe then claimed that Boston City Councilor Annissa Essaibi George’s more moderate platform and donations from two Super PACs with ties to former President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign appealed to white voters at large.

“She’s the status quo,” Monroe said, “and see, that’s the thing that really bothers me, because we will say, ‘Oh, we got a person of color.’ Cosmetically we do, but ideologically we really don’t.”

Monroe is a syndicated religion columnist, the Boston voice for Detour’s African American Heritage Trail, and a visiting researcher in the Religion and Conflict Transformation Program at the Boston University School of Theology. Price is the founding pastor of Community of Love Christian Fellowship in Allston and the Inaugural Dean of Africana Studies at Berklee College of Music. Together, they host GBH’s All Rev’d Up podcast.