In the wake of Jesse Jackson Jr.’s legal woes, there will be a special election to fill his Congressional seat.

And with quite a few African American candidates vying for his spot, many are concerned the black vote will be split, and a white candidate will win the race.

From Black Politics on the Web:

The worries escalated this week after former Rep. Debbie Halvorson, a white Democrat and veteran of suburban Chicago politics, threw her hat into the ring.

Losing Jackson’s seat would be a blow to the black establishment. Chicago, long a center of black cultural and political power — it’s the home of the nation’s first black president, Barack Obama, and the first 20th-century black member of Congress, Oscar De Priest — would see its delegation in the Congressional Black Caucus diminish from three seats to two. And there’s Jackson’s background as the son of iconic civil rights leader the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

Jackson’s district, which first elected him in 1995, contains a small majority of black voters.

Read more at blackpoliticsontheweb.com

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