Trump’s Black Supporters: Inside a Small and Divided World

WASHINGTON — The surprise hits of the annual gathering of right-wing activists in Washington were appearances by three black women. Lynnette Hardaway and Rochelle Richardson, better known as Diamond and Silk, thanked the organizers for inviting them — “two conservative black chicks” — before mocking reparations. Candace Owens, the fiery young YouTube sensation, called on black people to escape from the country’s liberal ideology.

Their unapologetic support for President Trump was greeted with huge applause at the Conservative Political Action Conference, which concluded Saturday with an appearance by the president. Days before, Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s former lawyer and fixer, testified before a Congressional committee that the president is a racist who had once said that black people were “too stupid” to vote for him.

“I don’t believe the president said that,” Ms. Owens said in an interview from the bustling convention hall on Friday. “The second you put him in front of a crowd of black Americans, they love him. They walk away and they say, ‘he’s amazing.’”

All three women are part of the small but diverse collection of black Trump supporters who operate out of TV studio green rooms and appear at rallies far from the president’s inner circle in the West Wing. They advocate on the president’s behalf. Their very presence, some of Mr. Trump’s backers argue, is evidence that the president’s critics are wrong that he is a racist.

At the committee hearing, the surprise appearance of a black Trump surrogate raised fresh debates in Washington about the paltry number of black people who are in Mr. Trump’s orbit — the few who have worked in his private company or work in his White House, serve in his cabinet and speak for him on his favorite medium of cable news — and what their presence means for the administration.

According to some polls, 92 percent of black voters, who are overwhelmingly Democrats, disapprove of Mr. Trump. But even among the small collection of Mr. Trump’s African-American supporters, there are factions.