The Rev. Al Sharpton asked and answered some pointed questions about the state of Black Business in New Jersey last Friday during his keynote address at the African American Chamber of Commerce’s 2026 Economic Summit at the Princeton Marriott.
Here is the best of the bunch:
10. The numbers prove New Jersey is underpaying Black communities
A three-year study of $11 billion in statewide spending found that Black New Jerseyans received less than 1%.
“It’s not a race thing; it’s an investment thing,” he said.
9. Votes and dollars without reciprocity feel like a new form of bondage
When politicians and institutions happily take Black votes and consumer dollars but offer no meaningful economic return, he says it echoes an old system in modern form.
“If we invest our dollars with you, if we put our votes with you, then where is the return?” he said. “To accept our consumer dollar and accept our votes, but do not accept what they’re going to reciprocate (is) an enslaved environment,” he said.
8. Public subsidies and contracts are flowing past Black New Jersey
He points out that almost every major business in the state is propped up by government money — money that Black taxpayers helped put there — yet contracts still go elsewhere.
“Every major business in New Jersey is subsidized with government money,” he said. “So (they) are taking our government tax dollars and giving contracts to people that had nothing to do with you (getting people elected).”
7. Pension dollars are funding gentrification
Union pensions built by Black and Brown workers are often invested in developers who then push those same communities out of their homes.
“Grandma is being gentrified out of her house because you investing her dollars in the developer that’s gentrified,” he said. “So, we’re paying for our own removal.”
6. Symbolic politics is a losing trade
Sharptong ridicules the idea that photo-ops and safe seats are adequate payment for decades of loyalty. Black communities are too often offered access and symbolism instead of contracts and ownership — and New Jersey has learned they’ll accept it.
He told the crowd: If you keep accepting Black History Month checks and mansion pictures in place of real business, that’s exactly what you’ll keep getting.
5. Inside negotiators need outside pressure
Deals in Trenton and boardrooms don’t move on their own. He draws a clear division: some people negotiate inside, others turn up the heat outside so those negotiators have leverage.
“You do not get anything inside unless somebody else is turning the heat up — so that they sweating inside.”
4. The goal is normal business, not charity
Sharpton was explicit that this is not about favors. When Black entrepreneurs get contracts, they hire, invest, and lift communities — just like anyone else. The demand is for ordinary participation in the state’s economic life, not special treatment.
3. An “inferiority complex” keeps people from demanding fair value
He argues that one barrier is psychological: a taught sense of lesser entitlement that makes communities grateful for crumbs.
“We have such inferiority complex that we don’t demand the trade that our numbers dictate, that our forefathers paid for,” he said.
New Jersey politics, in his view, changes when Black voters see themselves as equals at the table, not as supplicants.
2. History shows Black New Jersey has already done the impossible
By invoking slavery, stolen names, bans on literacy and property, he’s not reciting tragedy for its own sake. He’s arguing that surviving all of that proves a level of toughness and ingenuity that should command respect — not deference to others.
“Why am I bowing to you? You ought to be bowing to me for being as tough as I’ve been,” he said. “You started with a 20-yard advantage. I started behind the start line, yet I caught up with you, and you talk about you gave me a favor.”
1. “Now it’s paying time” for New Jersey
The bottom line is that the era of one-way loyalty needs to end. After centuries of unpaid labor and generations of votes, he says the account is overdue.
Sharpton said Blacks in New Jersey deserve a fair share of government contracts, investment and economic power that finally matches the weight of Black support.
“We don’t want favors,” he said. “We want equality.
