Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., will attempt to gin up support for criminal justice reform, school choice and economic freedom zones during his address to the Urban League convention Friday.

In a preview of his speech, Paul – the only Republican elected official slated to speak to the largely African-American conference – told U.S. News he expected his policy ideas to resonate with the crowd, despite their long-held allegiance to the Democratic Party.

"I'm not so sure there will be resistance to any of the three," says Paul, of the ideas he will promote. "It's policy driven but I go there also with the intention of trying to convince African-American voters that there are Republicans that are interested in their votes."

The 2016 presidential prospect has mounted a sustained effort to broaden the GOP and actually appearing before black audiences has been an integral part of the strategy. None of the topics Paul plans to cover will be new, but the audience will be.

Paul is pushing legislation that would restore federal voting rights for certain nonviolent felons who have completed their sentences. Additionally, he wants to scrap mandatory minimum sentences for low-level drug users. He says he's been lobbying Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to hold a vote on these criminal justice reforms sometime this year.

"I think there's every chance we could pass some of these things if we could just get them to the floor. That's sort of been the story of this Congress, that nothing gets to the floor," he says.

On Friday, he'll also advocate for the ability of parents to send their children to a private school or charter school of their choice. He expects his pitch for broader educational options to be received warmly.

"If you ask and poll among people who live either in poverty or in cities or minorities in general, I think you'll find that school choice is seen favorably and so are charter schools," he says. "When you ask the question about charter schools in Kentucky, I think it's a 75 percent issue in the African-American community that they agree that we should try new educational innovations."

Economic freedom zones, however, is a newer idea that may need more time to develop. It involves drastically lowering taxes in economically depraved areas of the country to spur growth from Appalachia to Detroit.

"The government-originated stimulus really just hasn't worked and this is a way to look at the same amounts of money, large amounts of money. But the money basically has never been sent to Washington and remains in those cities," he says.

Paul estimated his plan would create enough jobs to generate $413 million over a decade in Cincinnati – the site of the Urban League convention – but the Cincinnati Enquirer noted his staff declined to share the formula for how they reached that conclusion.

Paul has gotten a mixed response from his ventures before African-American audiences but he appears unafraid of the political risk attached to such appearances. At Howard University last year, he found himself in testy back-and-forths with students over voter I.D. laws and interpreting the Civil Rights Act.

"I guess I don't look at things that way," he says of the risk. "I look that we have to move the agenda forward. We have to figure out new ways to figure out old and persistent problems."

More so, just because African-Americans agree with some of his ideas hardly means they'd ever agree to pull the lever for him – or any Republican.

Asked what type of reception he expected Friday, Paul responded, "I don't know. We'll find out."

But he does get credit for doing what most Republicans aren't – and that's showing up, everywhere.

Paul says he couldn't make it to this week's NAACP convention due to the congressional schedule, but is already planning a fall appearance at Bowie State University, the historically black member of the University of Maryland system. He says he wants to get the NAACP involved in that event.