As he prepares to convene his annual National Action Network tomorrow, the Rev. Al Sharpton is planning to ask serious questions of Republican National Committee Michael Steele about addressing key policy questions.
“I want to ask him how he plans (to advance) a civil rights” platform, including issues such as education, and other areas important to the African-American agenda nationally, Sharpton told The Post.
Steele will be appearing about two weeks after he deflected questions about the RNC spending money at a sex-themed club in California – along with other reports of lavish spending – by suggesting he and President Obama have a “slimmer margin” of error because of being African-American.
“A lot of folks do,” he told ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “It’s a different role for me to play and others to play and that’s just the reality of it. But you take that as part of the nature of it.”
The White House pushed back that Steele’s problem wasn’t the race card, it’s “the credit card.”
Sharpton, who is a close ally of Obama, refused to wade into that controversy, saying he would not ask Steele about the issue – although if the RNC chairman were to bring it up, that’s his prerogative.
“I want to talk about policy,” said Sharpton.
Steele is one of the featured speakers at the three-day event at the Sheraton New York in Midtown, which will also be attended by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, former Bloomberg administration official and current HUD secretary Shaun Donovan, and Mariah Carey and Wyclef Jean, among ors.