Lessons of Gov. Northam, Rep. Omar: What to say after you say 'sorry' in politics

Amid all the calls for the resignation of Gov. Ralph Northam, who admitted to wearing blackface makeup in the 1980s when he was a medical student, guess which group of Virginia voters is most staunchly supporting Northam?

Would you believe, African-Americans?

Yes, according to a Washington Post-Schar School poll taken as the controversy boiled last week, a 58 percent majority of black Virginia residents who identify or lean Democratic said he should remain in office. That's compared with 49 percent of white Democratic voters and leaners.

As an African-American, I was surprised but not shocked to hear that the group that presumably should be the most offended by Northam's youthful indiscretion may well be his strongest supporters as a group.

For one, we tend to be a forgiving group, especially for people who support an equal-rights agenda. We so appreciate the historic civil rights laws that President Lyndon Johnson pushed to passage in the 1960s, for example, that we have all but forgotten the powerful Texan's leadership in the Senate of Southern Democratic opposition to civil rights in the 1950s.

For another, Northam, who acknowledges growing up with "white privilege" in rural Virginia, has an admirable record on poverty and civil rights issues that black voters tend to care about. He has worked to expand health care under Medicaid to the poor and restore voting rights to felons, and he favored the removal of monuments to the Confederacy from public spaces.

No wonder 87 percent of the state's black voters turned out to vote him into office in 2017.

Although the Post poll didn't break out results by age, I am guessing that the polling sample was older than Virginia's general population. We older voters tend to turn out in much larger numbers than younger voters. We also tend to remember the days when segregation and other injustices were so much worse that the wearing of blackface sounds like a minor offense.

All of which gives me a sliver of hope for two other embattled officeholders, freshman Democratic Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, who have been taking heat for their criticism of Israel.

Omar responded to a tweet opposing the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement with a sarcastic tweet, quoting Puff Daddy's homage to $100 bills, "It's all about the Benjamins, baby." Asked who was paying U.S. politicians to be pro-Israel, she responded, "AIPAC," meaning the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, this country's most prominent pro-Israel lobby and frequent object of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the rest of House Democratic leadership, as well as numerous Republicans and Jewish leaders, wasted no time in rebuking Omar's remarks and calling on her to apologize for her use of what Pelosi called "anti-Semitic tropes and prejudicial accusations about Israel's supporters."

Omar immediately issued an "unequivocal" apology, saying, "Anti-Semitism is real and I am grateful for Jewish allies and colleagues who are educating me on the painful history of anti-Semitic tropes."

Good for her. I wish we would have such similarly swift regrets from President Donald Trump, who last weekend again mocked Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Democratic presidential candidate, as "Pocahontas." Or Rep. Steve King, the Iowa Republican who, after years of offensive remarks about "white supremacy" and "white nationalism" was finally removed by Republicans from all House committee assignments, after Republicans lost their House majority.

Omar, a Somali-American and the first member of Congress to wear a hijab, knows about that deterioration in discourse. Looking at some of the tweets she has received, calling for her to be impeached, deported or worse, shows how far we need to go with bridging racial, ethnic and cultural gaps in this country.

But looking at what Gov. Northam has done in Virginia, redoubling his efforts to do a "listening tour" and other conversation starters around race and heritage since his job came under fire, points the way to a brighter future, if we work at it.

I can easily understand how Omar, a newcomer to national politics, can be tone-deaf to the sinister implications of criticism that steps over the line from honest Middle East policy debate to a repeating of, unfortunately, widespread and false anti-Semitic tropes.

For example, AIPAC, which rallies donors on behalf of pro-Israel candidates but doesn't make direct contributions to candidates, is far exceeded by evangelical Christians and other non-Jewish conservatives as major donors on behalf of Israel.

I have denounced bigotry and anti-Semitism, whether it comes from Trump's "Muslim ban" demagoguery or Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan. If Americans are going to overcome the legacy of our hate-infected past, we need to work together against those who would profit from tearing us apart.

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(E-mail Clarence Page at cpage@chicagotribune.com.)