This week, Cory Booker became the fourth African-American to be elected to the U.S. Senate since Reconstruction. The former Newark mayor defeated Republican candidate Steve Lonegan, garnering nearly 56 percent of the vote to Lonegan’s 43 percent.
NBC News correspondent Ron Allen caught up with Booker this week in New York and asked him to reflect on his historic victory.
“I think that the gravity of that hit me a lot,” Booker told Allen. “When I was traveling around New Jersey, people didn’t bring up [race].”
In August, Lonegan’s campaign team drew criticism for what the Booker campaign and many others considered a racially offensive tweet directed at Booker. The tweet, which was later deleted, showed a map of Newark that included different sections labeled “West Africa, Portugal, Brazil and Guyana” – a reference to what the tweet also described as “Cory Booker’s foreign policy debate prep notes.”
Lonegan’s camp took down the tweet and denied any racist intent.
TheGrio | RELATED CONTENT:
- Opinion: What Cory Booker will do in the Senate
- Cory Booker not afraid to ‘break dishes’ serving NJ in the US Senate
- Opinion: Rapper Rah Digga has words for Cory Booker
Booker told Allen voters were more concerned about his performance than his race. And for him, that was a sign of progress.
“The fact that we can run a Senate campaign as an African-American and people not look at the color of my skin but [say] ‘Hey, how can you help? What can you do?” shows how far we’ve come.” Booker said.
Follow theGrio’s Correspondent Todd Johnson on Twitter @rantoddj