Kamala Harris is having trouble winning over young Black men. Former President Barack Obama believes it’s because she’s a woman. I think the explanation is a bit more complicated than that — and a lot less patronizing. Sure, if you ask one of these young men why they like Donald Trump, they’ll say something about him being a man of action, but they will also say that after years of voting for the Democrats, they see little benefit in continuing to do so.

“Democrats expect your vote; they don’t work for it,” they often say.

If pressed, they’ll point to Trump’s support for historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) while president and repeat his phony promises to boost Black employment. But, they’ll struggle to list any Democratic policies they support.

One Democrat-led policy that is not getting enough attention in the Black community — even though it holds enormous historical and economic significance for African Americans — is student loan forgiveness. If the Democrats could find a way to discuss loan forgiveness properly, it could be the key to Harris making inroads with Black Gen Z men.

Experts believe that because student loan forgiveness disproportionately impacts Black Americans, it can have a real effect on the racial wealth gap. Young Black voters must be helped to understand this, and they need to see that the Democrats’ strong support for loan forgiveness is a show of support for the Black community. Democrats might also benefit politically if they could help Black voters appreciate the intellectual connection between the concept of loan forgiveness and the concept of Black reparations.

Black Gen Z-ers support (by huge percentages) the idea of paying reparations to the descendants of enslaved Africans in America. Democrats need to help them understand that student loan forgiveness can be viewed as a form of reparations.

Student loan forgiveness benefits everyone, not just the Black community. But, for a host of reasons, it is particularly beneficial to African Americans. The Biden/Harris administration understands this. Anyone focused on higher education understands this. When I first learned that President Joe Biden was planning to forgive huge swaths of student loans, I understood the significance immediately and recognized its deeper historical meaning.

Since the amount of a student loan payment can be the equivalent of a mortgage payment, for some Black families, loan forgiveness can mean the real possibility of homeownership and a more stable economic future. This was a promise once made to African Americans.

After the Civil War, General William Tecumseh Sherman asked a group of Black community leaders what he could do personally to help the millions of newly freed slaves lift themselves out of poverty. Acting on their recommendations, Sherman led what historian Henry Louis Gates Jr. described as “the first systematic attempt to provide a form of reparations” to Black Americans. He issued a field order setting aside hundreds of thousands of acres of farmland for distribution to freedmen. With the stroke of his pen, he extended to millions of African Americans the promise of a home of their own, a chance to be self-sufficient, to build wealth and to pass it down to future generations. But Sherman’s promise wasn’t kept. Eight months after he issued the order, President Andrew Johnson overturned it.

I once argued against the viability of reparations. I thought the idea was preposterous. How could this nation ever repay its debt to a people whose flesh was literally the source of its wealth?

What I lacked at the time was the imagination to understand the many forms reparations can take. Affirmative action, for example, can be viewed as a form of reparations. It didn’t occur to me at the time that student loan forgiveness can also be seen this way.

The Biden/Harris administration has already forgiven billions in student loans. When speaking to young Black men, campaign officials could easily argue that one of the reasons Democrats are fighting in the courts so aggressively for loan relief is to help repay the moral debt this nation owes to those who helped to build it. Harris has already said that if elected president she will continue Biden’s efforts. Someone — maybe not her, but certainly someone — should make the connection between the Democrats’ commitment to student loan forgiveness and its support for the idea of reparations.

And, while on the subject, they might also use the occasion to expose the deception in Trump’s support for HBCUs. Voters must be shown how Trump’s actions can be viewed as an effort to channel students of color away from heavily white institutions, like the University of Maryland, College Park, toward predominantly Black ones, like Morgan State. This becomes even more apparent when viewed in tandem with Trump’s regressive educational policies while president and his support for overturning affirmative action.

The Democratic Party’s quiet fight for reparations is a brilliant political strategy. Kamala Harris needs to take more credit for it, not just for the sake of young Black men.

K. Ward Cummings is an essayist and social critic. He lives in Baltimore.