Midterm season is heating up after Texas, North Carolina, and Arkansas wrapped their primaries last night. Democrats saw major wins — but will that momentum carry into the rest of the election year? And are Black Americans less willing to protest today than in previous years?
On this special dispatch from The Tea, April Ryan sits down with Democratic pollster Terrance Woodbury to break down more of what we could see in the primaries, voter trends, and how resistance can come in many forms.
Terrance Woodbury is the President & Founding Partner of HIT Strategies. He has worked with groups like the DNC, DSCC, Rockefeller, and Gates Foundations to shape their research and outreach. Prior to founding HIT Strategies, Terrence was the research director at a boutique polling firm and worked at the Brookings Institution.
April Ryan
And again, with us for more tea, knocking the pot over is none other than Terrence Woodley of Hit Strategies, pollster, to people like Jasmine Crockett, he had been a pollster, to Chris Jones out of Arkansas. He knows the numbers, he knows the issues. Terrence, thank you for joining me. I’m looking forward to you knocking the pot over, because every time you give me your stats, I’m like, really? Really? So, and it was great seeing you at the Image Awards. The image… positive image of Black America is important in this time, right?
Terrance Woodbury
That’s exactly right. I mean, I was very needed. I feel refreshed, I feel full, I feel ready for the fight that we have ahead. Thanks for having me.
April Ryan
Yeah, from Sam Jackson, Viola Davis, to Michael B. Jordan, I mean, there was some…
Terrance Woodbury
Jackson Tributes keep hope alive, you know?
April Ryan
Yes, I am somebody.
Right, and with this… with this… this era that we are in, your polls matter so much more. I am somebody, because you have something that goes to Black resistance, as it also relates to No Kings Day, as it relates to a lot of the white marches as well. Can you talk to us about that really fast?
Terrance Woodbury
Absolutely, April. So, Hit Strategies recently put out a Black Ops research project that’s been spending the last year researching Black people’s willingness or unwillingness to participate in these resistance protests, whether it’s a No Kings rally or an ICE Out March, many of us have been looking at these protests and seeing that the complexion is a little bit different than what it was during the Black.
April Ryan
Let’s melanate it, let’s be honest, less melanate it.
Terrance Woodbury
It’s a little, you know, they look a little… so I wanted to talk to Black folks, you know, specifically Black folks that were participating in protests in 2020 during the Black Lives Matter movement, and figure out why they weren’t participating now. And frankly, a lot of Black folks just feel like there’s… they’re either afraid, you know, they fear arrest, they fear state-sanctioned violence, they see white people getting shot in the streets. Okay? Black… Black voters understand that there is a… there’s even a, you know, a desire…a desire to see more Black people in the streets so that they can unleash more violence. And so, look, Black folks are participating, we’re just finding different ways to participate. We’re boycotting, right? We’re posting information online, things that we could do privately without putting our bodies on the line, in public demonstration.
April Ryan
Which is why I think the primary, you know, these primary elections are a way that people are expressing.
Terrance Woodbury
They’re discontent expressing their frustration.
April Ryan
And that’s so important, because remember when Kamala Harris, November 5th, 2020… this is when we had Trump for a year now, it was 2024. Yeah. November 5th, 2024. I’ll never forget. People were like, I’m sitting on… after Kamala Harris lost, we saw that beautiful picture of Black women sipping tea on the wall, seeing the city burn. The city did burn. And that was so much… there was so much commentary around that. And that was kind of the beginning, right, of the sit-back resistance. Is that what you would say?
Terrance Woodbury
That’s exactly right, April. You know, we are detecting mis- and disinformation towards our people, telling our folks to withdraw, telling Black folks that this is not our fight, or even telling Black women that you were in the 92% that did the right thing, so you did your part. and you don’t have to do anything else. Well, we know that that’s not how resistance works. We know that Black…Black people have always led liberation movements to liberate our communities, but to also just liberate America.
April Ryan
That’s right.
Terrance Woodbury
Similar to the 2020 election, where the movement is what drove so much of the votes, of the participation in that election because of Black Lives Matter movement, this is… this election in 2026 is going to be determined by who does and doesn’t resist, and resistance doesn’t just mean protests, right? Resistance could be those little black boxes we used to put on our social media.
April Ryan
That’s right.
Terrance Woodbury
Resistance means not shopping at Target. Resistance means all kinds of things, and what we know is that if we can get folks to take any action now, even if it’s changing their social media box to black, then it’s more likely that they will vote later.
April Ryan
This conversation… this platform, the contrarian, is resistance. It’s information. And people don’t understand. It’s not always everybody out there in the street protesting. And I remember, Terrence, hearing stories of the Civil Rights Marshals. You know, a lot of women in the South, they couldn’t do so much, but what they did was opened up their homes, gave food from the fields, tomatoes and tomatoes. The Maidas Me and Tomatoes, okay? And, and those butter beans, and had those palates for Jesse Jackson, and Dr. King, and John Lewis, Harry Belafonte, and Julian Bond, and Andy Young. It’s what you could do.
And so, and you’re absolutely right. Now, the NAACP, Derek Johnson, has said, and I’ve heard him say, you know, be careful. If we’re out there protesting, they want to come after us, they want to create martial law. There is an attack on the browning of America, black and brown America. Minnesota is not just brown, it’s Black as well. It’s Somalis and other Africans, you know? What’s happening across the nation, so you’re absolutely right. There is an understanding of trying to be ahead of…what the opposition, if you will, people don’t like us to try to do, if you can speak.
Terrance Woodbury
That’s right, and look, April, you’re absolutely right. Like, you know, just because we are now on the front lines protesting, because we’re not on the front lines demonstrating, doesn’t mean we’re not… we’re not resisting. We know, look, everybody doesn’t have to do everything. But we all must do something. And to your point, April, this show, this platform is resistance. Keeping our community informed is resistance, because information is power, and it makes us feel empowered when we know what’s happening. And far too often, we don’t get a lot of that information on entertainment news, and so folks have to seek platforms like this to stay informed, stay educated, and to keep our folks empowered.
April Ryan
On entertainment news, the three-letter word, right?
Terrance Woodbury
Entertainment news, that’s right.
April Ryan
Yeah, that’s actually trying to take over another… that’s a whole other story. But what are the top lines from this study, though, that you found? Because our white allies have been out there fighting. I mean, no Kings Day, hundreds of thousands of people all across of the country and even the world, and they wonder, but they are fighting for us, and we thank you. But what are the top lines that you would give our allies so they understand that we appreciate we’re not just sitting back?
Terrance Woodbury
Yeah, that’s right. So first, I think we have to resist, we have to reject this narrative that black folks are taking a break from this one. We are not. Black folks are engaged, we’re just engaged in different ways. The five top ways that Black… the five top actions that Black people are willing to take to resist are things like voting in elections, boycotting companies that do harm to us, buying from Black-owned businesses, keeping our communities informed, and ensuring that the folks that we know… I’m sorry, ensuring the folks around us know how to vote. Notably, Rachel, those are all very private actions. Voting and keeping our community informed and Boycotting. Black folks are resisting in very private ways. But we are going to have to continue to, you know, as we go into this primary season, even in Texas, when we see a primary that just happened this week.
We are seeing black folks show up and show out in historic ways. Black people participate in the Texas early vote at almost the same way that they participated on Election Day in 2024.
April Ryan
So, here’s the thing, and I just found out my local precinct was redistricted, and I’m like, what? What? And this redistricting thing kind of disenfranchises people, if you didn’t know, because a candidate actually reached out to me. She said, April, look, she said, do you know that there was a redistricting? I said, I got something. She said, yes, and she helped me find my district. So what… what does that mean? in this midterm election? Because I… I didn’t know. I did not know.
Terrance Woodbury
Ryan didn’t know. April Ryan, who has been… listen, whose responsibility it is to keep her ear to the ground, to know what’s happening in these streets.
April Ryan
I know what’s happening in the streets nationally, but in my own.
Terrance Woodbury
Could you imagine?
April Ryan
Right.
Terrance Woodbury
I couldn’t imagine what this is doing, that, you know, the confusion and the chaos is a part of the… that’s a part of the plan. Right? The plan is to not only confuse us, to create chaos, but to scare us. As he’s deploying FBI agents to election precincts, as he’s threatening to deploy ICE agents around election precincts, the plan is to scare us. But we… but we will not be deterred. This is not the first time Black folks have faced state-sanctioned violence. I would like folks to be reminded by the legacy of Jesse Jackson to keep hope alive, right? Because this ain’t the first time that we have been deterred from voting, that they try to make it harder for us to vote. But what we see is when they try to rig the rules, when folks like Jasmine Crockett try to fight this system, that the system will fight back. They tried to draw that sister right out of Congress, and now she’s running for Senate.
April Ryan
So, so, with this wave. I feel that there’s a tsunami, but there are these little tactics. Yes, I’m in what people call Wakanda in Maryland, but I, too, did not know my precinct was redistricting. And when you get those forms from your board of election supervisors in your state, open it to find out your polling place. Because, see with my determination, if I didn’t know, I would have gone to the old place, and they said, oh, you’re not here. I said, and I still would have driven, but how many people would do that. That’s right. That’s right. So, what are you seeing? What do you anticipate? With this election cycle, this primary election cycle.
Terrance Woodbury
Yeah, April, look, one thing I want to do, I want to encourage the people listening here, because your audience are amongst the most informed, right? They seek information, they come here to stay informed, but I have to encourage the folks that are listening that that’s actually not enough. It’s not enough for you to be informed. You have to share that information. You have to repost April Ryan’s show. You gotta open your election notice, and then post that information. Send it to your family group chat, let them know, because we are the most trusted messengers in our community. When we act in this Black Ops project. who are the leaders that you trust to give you information about voting? We list things like elected officials, and Black church leaders and black members of Congress, Black business leaders. You know who they say are the most trusted leaders? People like them.: They’re friends and family, and so they are looking to us to keep them informed, and that is a powerful form of resistance. So I want to encourage folks to continue to share this show and share the information that you’re hearing. But I expect black folks to show up in this primary the same way we see them showing up in Texas, in historic numbers, as a show of their resistance and discontent.
April Ryan
Georgia’s on my mind, and… and people keep saying, no, Keisha’s knocking on… I said, let me tell you something, and I’m not a pollster, but I’ve been doing this for a long time, and I see certain indicators, right? You’ve got white farmers. in rural areas in this nation, in red states, that are dis… disenfranchised, that are upset, that are hurting. Their pocket is hurting. They’ve been turned on. Their soy is not being sold to China, their meat…is being challenged by other countries, and they’re not getting the profits that they used to. And that’s just white farmers. That’s right. Not even talking about Black farmers. And in places like Georgia, where farming is a top industry does Keisha Lance Bottoms have a chance? Because people are very upset.
Terrance Woodbury
Yeah. Yeah, look, in transparency, I am Jasmine Carus pollster, but I’m also Keisha Lance Bottoms pollster. And so, in transparency, I work for both of these campaigns, and I can tell you, you know, when we…when we hear these electability arguments, specifically about Black women, or Black candidates in general, we hear the same thing about Mandela Barnes in Wisconsin. what I often have to remind people is the electability argument is just depending on who you consider the swing voter, right? If the swing voter that you are going after are white suburban women who have voted for Trump 3 times. Majority of white suburban women have voted for Trump 3 times now. as opposed to the swing voter that, that Trump did a little bit better with men of color, and a little bit better with young people, and a little bit better with young black men, right? Those were the swing voters that Trump was improving his margins on. by 3 or 4 or 5% over the last two cycles. Well, that is the swing voter that a candidate like Jasmine Crockett and Keisha Lance Bottoms appeals to. They appeal to those young voters of color that have been splintering from the Democratic coalition. They appeal to men of color that have been splintering from the Democratic coalition, and so I believe that candidates like Jasmine Crockett and Keisha Lance Bottoms are the most electable, because they help Democrats reassemble the base that has been splintered.
April Ryan
And for full transparency, as you’re being transparent, they just happen to be running for office, and they just both happen to be my sorros from Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. But there are other candidates out here. But there’s some things that… and again, that’s transparency, but these are women who are out here running for these major seats. I mean, think about it. Stacey Abrams, a Black woman, did the unthinkable. When people…discounted her. That’s right. She overturned… she made Georgia… she turned that blood-red state, turned it blue, right? Right. So the bottom line is. I think Georgia is on the precipice. North Carolina is now purple, right? Or is it purple, or is it still kind of a shade of red that has a lot of blue popping through it? You know, what is…
Terrance Woodbury
The South is getting real purple. I tell the folks all the time, the South are not red states, they’re just a bunch of oppressed states. Listen, think about it, April, and across the South, you have states that have the largest Black-eligible voting population in places like Mississippi, Louisiana, but they also have the lowest Black turnout. That’s not.
April Ryan
And the highest number of Black folks are in the southeast of the nation.
Terrance Woodbury
That’s right. That’s right. You have more… the highest rate of eligible black voters in any state in America is North Carolina and Louisiana. Top two. They also have the lowest black turnout. Those coincidences…Those ain’ coincidences, that’s oppression, right?
April Ryan
Terrence, come on, you preaching today, looking like Frankie Beverly with your baseball cap and your Creek shirt. Happy feelings, enjoy and pain. So listen, I got 3 questions for you, and I’m gonna let you go, because your time is so… your time is fleeting, and it’s important, and I thank God that I’ve had you twice in a week, because sometimes I just run at you. I’m traveling here, I’m traveling here, but I take it down.
Terrance Woodbury
We’ll pull that phone out in the middle of the airport and do an interview.
April Ryan
I will pull that phone out anyway, you know it, I don’t care!
Terrance Woodbury
Thank you!
April Ryan
Well, we get the message across, and it’s about the message. But Terrence, white women… let’s go back to white women. We thought, when Kamala Harris was running against Donald Trump, that white women were going… and the abortion issue was going to put her over the top. That didn’t happen.
Terrance Woodbury
We… we did not think… I did not think that.
April Ryan
Okay! We were hearing, everybody was like, I’m upset, and they were protesting at the Supreme Court and everything, but it didn’t.
Terrance Woodbury
Nope, I did not think that. I… and in transparency, I was also Kamala Harris’ pollster. I never believed that white women were going to vote for her at higher rates than they voted for Hillary Clinton. for Scranton Joe, and they did not, right? She did not get a single point more black… I’m sorry, more white women’s votes than Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden. And so I’ve long stopped believing that white women were who was gonna save the Democratic Party. A majority of white women are going to vote for Republicans in almost every election.
And so we have to reassemble a different coalition. It’s young people that have been splintering or staying home. In Texas, there are 800 black people that didn’t vote in the last election. Kamala Harris lost by 200,000 votes.
You know, there’s 1.2 million young people that didn’t vote in Texas in the last election, but she lost by 200,000 votes. So, I mean, I believe that the winning coalition that Democrats are gonna need is who I call the newswing voters, and that’s young people of color, and men of color that have determined the outcome of the last few elections.
April Ryan
So, a lot of young Black people In the last election, Black men voted for Donald John Trump. God knows why, I don’t know. And I’m not saying that I’m saying that as a journalist, and I’m saying that as a Black person. I’m saying that as somebody who has been targeted by this man. I don’t… is it familiarity, or is it… he speaks like… like I do? Is it like a lot of the people who are in Kentucky who didn’t know that Obamacare was ACA? Is it, you know. Is it just, he talks like me, he seems like he’s cool? Is that what it is? Relatability over policy and thought and speak?
Terrance Woodbury
Well, look, one thing I will say is that it’s not just young Black men, it’s young Black people, right? It is… but we have a gender gap in the Black community between Black men and Black women, but we also have a generation gap. younger Black voters and older Black voters. And what a lot of younger Black people and… and Black men were appealed to in Donald Trump. There are various reasons, right? Some of it was cultural, some of it was economic, but most of them were just what I call Trump-curious. Right? They were curious about what he would do. They never loved him. They never even liked him more than they liked her. They just… they were curious about what he could do, and now many of those voters are becoming what I call Trump-furious. Those first… those last into his coalition are the first ones out. And that’s why what we saw is, you know, in 2024, where he did a little bit better with black men, a little bit better with young black voters. In 2025, those voters returned to the Democratic Coalition in places like Virginia, and New Jersey, and New York. But what I keep warning Democrats is not to take those voters for granted. They didn’t come home, they’re not Democratic voters, they are swing voters. And they swung to Trump in 2025, I’m sorry, in 2024, and they swung back to Democrats in 2025, but we must earn their votes in 2026.
April Ryan
Detroit. Donald Trump has impacted the auto industry, the tariffs on aluminum and steel. Does that make a difference for the average American?
Terrance Woodbury: there are some… listen, Detroit is a unique, a unique microcosm, right?
April Ryan: It is!
Terrance Woodbury: Man, listen, economy is happening different in Detroit than it’s happened everywhere else. I mean, I go around the country sit in focus groups and ask folks what issue keeps them up at night. Detroit, Michigan is the only place where I hear car insurance costs. It’s the only place in America that car insurance is keeping folks up at night.
April Ryan: I love the D, but you got a lot… there’s a lot of different lines.
Terrance Woodbury: an economy happening there.
April Ryan: Yeah, it’s, yeah.
Terrance Woodbury: We have a historic candidacy and a black woman running for mayor there. We have a historic candidacy in a black man running for governor. Several black women running for U.S. Senate in Illinois… I’m sorry, those are in Illinois. : But yeah, there are some historic candidacies in Michigan that I expect to mobilize our folks, our, you know, Black people, but we have to engage there. The other thing about Detroit is Dearborn, right? the largest Muslim population in America, the largest Palestinian population in America, and we have to engage there, and Democrats are gonna have to get serious about this conversation.
April Ryan: And Biden didn’t do that well there.
Terrance Woodbury: That’s right.
April Ryan: And that’s crazy! He didn’t do that.
Terrance Woodbury: to get serious about the Palestinian conflict, because it is determined, it’s going to determine a lot of Democratic primaries in 2026.
April Ryan: And two last things. I know I said I have to go, and this is quick. Is this war going to be a determinant in this election?
Terrance Woodbury: You know, specifically for Black voters that I’m talking to often, they… Black folks don’t often engage in foreign policy the same way they do domestic policy that’s impacting, you know, them and their families and their communities, except that…We got… what Tupac said, you got money for war, but can’t feed the poor? Right, that’s Black folks’ question, is why you got all this money? to invade a… to capture a president in Venezuela, kill a president in Iran, and… but my… but my gas bill keep going up, and my electric bill keep going up, and I can’t afford eggs, but we can invade these oil-rich nations to make corporations more rich but we can’t afford my kid’s childcare no more. We can’t afford my Medicaid? So Black folks got questions, and I do think that, that that’s going to impact who they vote for in these midterm elections.
April Ryan: And lastly, and thank you, and we’re doing this interview before the March 3rd election, because Terrence is flying off and doing great things everywhere, but again, we’re so thankful. The last question, we are…out of Black History Month, now in Women’s History Month. Will this nation rise up to the occasion? Will we ever see a Black woman president, do you think Kamala’s coming back.
Terrance Woodbury: Is Kamala coming back? In transparency, I’m Kamala Harris’ poster, so I can…
April Ryan: So are you polling for her now? Are you pollin’ for her now?
Terrance Woodbury: I think that…
April Ryan: Are you polling for her now, Teddy?
Terrance Woodbury: I, I, listen, once I’m your poster, I’m always your poster, so…
April Ryan: Congrats.
Terrance Woodbury: got me for life. Just like Keisha Lance Bottoms got me for life, and Jasmine Crockett got me for life, Kamala Harris got me. And I’m in the business of electing Black women, so I believe that we are going to be able to elect a black woman president. But first, we need to elect a black woman, a U.S. Senate in Texas, and a black woman governor in Georgia.
April Ryan: And there’s some Black people, Mandela Barnes is out there for Wisconsin, you got Chris Jones in Arkansas, you were his poster, so you got him for life as well. But, I thank you. Guys, this… I mean, you know, sometimes we kept this light. But real, sometimes we have to take it in bites, because I’mma tell you, I got a laugh to keep from crying, and I need… I need it… I don’t need to hear the harsh truth like that. I need a little bit of softening. What is it? A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. I’m from that old school.
Terrance Woodbury: That’s right. And we gotta keep hope alive. We can’t beat people over the head with the world is ending every day without letting them know that we’re the ones that’s gonna save it.
April Ryan: The sky’s falling! The sky’s fallen!
Terrance Woodbury: That’s right.
April Ryan: Terrence Woodley of Hit Strategies. Thank you, my brother.
Terrance Woodbury: Thank you so much for having me, April.
April Ryan: This was a great interview. We gotta have you back, my friend!
Terrance Woodbury: Listen, I’ll be back, we’re just getting started, election’s just getting started, I’ll be back. Thank you so much, April, I’ll talk to you soon.
April Ryan: Make sure your people send us all the stats, because we love them. Thank you. That’s Terrence Woodbury from Hit Strategies. Thank you guys, and we’re going back to some more tea.
Terrance Woodbury: Thanks.
