In Left America, Saying Rural Americans Are Racist White Nationalists Is Less Offensive Than Believing Minorities Supporting Donald Trump Are Dumb or Gullible (Neither Is True)
It isn’t racism driving Trump support. It is the belief he will restore the American Dream to the vast majority of Americans who have been living a nightmare that last few years.
I recently had a somewhat shocking conversation with a highly-educated professional I’ve known for over fifteen years. I’ve always known the person (let’s call her "Sally") to be left-of-center, but not rabidly so. We usually talk about vacations we take with our kids. Knowing my political background, Sally asked me what I thought about the 2024 presidential election. I gave her my quick take, with the conclusion that I thought Donald Trump would win. In response, she stated that rural Americans just wanted Trump back in office so he could make America white. I wasn’t shocked by her statement, as I know the Left loves the meme that Trump is a racist white nationalist, but I was shocked SHE said it and said it to ME knowing I’m conservative.
My response to her was simple. First, I said there really is no proof that Trump is racist. Secondly, and, more importantly, if he was a racist, how did she explain the fact that he likely will secure the highest level of support in modern history for a Republican from minorities in 2024? She was dumbstruck, so I said she must think that minorities are just dumb or gullible. She protested strongly that she doesn’t believe that and expressing concern because she works with a minority. I laughed at her concern and again asked her to explain the juxtaposition represented by Trump being a racist AND getting the highest level of minority support in modern history as a Republican (Ulysses Grant got more in 1868 and 1872 due to his efforts in the Reconstruction Era). She remained silent.
I share this vignette to point out what I think was the most troubling aspect of the conversation. To Sally, it was perfectly okay to slur tens of millions of rural Americans as racist white nationalists who only support Trump because he will make America white, while at the same time being mortified that someone would think she thought minorities were dumb or gullible for supporting Trump. You get that?
Rural Americans = racist white nationalists < minorities = dumb or gullible
It seems to me both are fairly offensive views, but the former is far more repugnant than the latter. Yet, not to Sally and the tens of millions of highly-educated liberals who have no public explanation for Trump’s minority support, so likely say privately among partners and friends (and certainly not around minorities) that minorities are dumb or gullible. Kind of like when their favorite pundits say publicly that lower educated whites are dumb or gullible for supporting Republicans because it is the Democrats who shower them with government largesse. As I wrote about in October 2021, America is becoming a Bell Curve Electorate in which those Americans with college degrees or higher vote Left, as those Americans without college degrees vote Right, with minorities joining this divide more slowly. The minority divide started in 2016 with Trump’s first win; increased in 2020 when he gained votes among minorities in his losing bid, and appears to be surging in 2024. It will send the Left into orbit should Trump win DUE TO minority support.
So why are Democrats, the putative party of the people, so disconnected from their historic base? One reason may be that, for many in their increasingly well-educated pool of support, things are going swimmingly. Pollster Scott Rasmussen has done a deep dive on “the one percent”—urban dwellers with post-graduate degrees and incomes over $150,000. These, by a four-to-one margin, support Joe Biden and his climate policies and progressive agenda. These professionals, particularly women, are increasingly the base of the Democratic Party.
Whether as professionals or the ultra-wealthy, these Democrats may be voting their consciences, but also their class interests. Government, social assistance, and healthcare account for 56 percent of the 2.8 million net new jobs over the past year, notes the Wall Street Journal, and for nearly all employment gains in blue states such as New York and Illinois. Professionals concentrated in government and largely public funded health programs have benefited mightily under Biden. Those who work directly for Washington recently a nice 5 percent raise from their president.
The other side of the Democratic base, wealthier voters, are beneficiaries of the strong stock market. The top ten percentage hold roughly 60 percent of all stocks, while most others have holdings averaging $40,000. In contrast to real incomes, which have grown barely 1.7 percent since 2020, stock income has burgeoned by nearly 50 percent.
…
This great disconnect between the cognitive elites and the voters is large enough to re-elect Donald Trump. The progressive media will no doubt trace this result to racial animus and even a thirst for fascism, but it may be more instructive to look at class interest. Small businesses tend to be the strongest backers of Donald Trump, with roughly two thirds approval, not because they hate black people or gays but as a reaction to the high taxes and regulatory excess that increasingly imperil smaller firms which lack the resources to accommodate elaborate compliance mechanisms.
Then there are those who work in what my colleague Soledad Ursua calls the “carbon economy.” These labor in material industries—manufacturing and agriculture, and particularly ranching, logistics, and home construction—and their livelihoods are in particular threatened by Biden’s green policies. In Texas the price could be as many as a million generally good-paying jobs. Overall, according to a Chamber of Commerce report, a full national ban on fracking, widely supported by greens, would cost 14 million jobs—far more than the eight million jobs lost in the Great Recession of 2007-2009.
…
Ultimately, most Americans vote their pocketbooks more than their skin color. Despite being the most ostentatiously multikulti administration in history, Biden’s support among non-whites, according to the New York Times, has dropped significantly, even among his strongest base, the African American community. The gap among black voters favoring Democrats over Republicans has shrunk, according to Gallup, from almost 80 percentage points to just 47 points now. The border crisis is one factor undermining his support among African Americans, including some black Democrats. In big cities like New York and Chicago, migrants, attracted by “sanctuary cities” which assure them soft treatment, are seen as competing for scarce jobs and resources.
Of course, Biden or any Democrat can count on winning the black vote, in part because many working- and middle-class blacks—far more than other populations—work for the government, making them susceptible to Democratic largesse. But there is serious erosion among working-class blacks, particularly men.
As in the rest of the population, black college graduates tend to be more supportive of the Democrats, but many other African Americans work in the carbon economy—roughly one-fourth of UAW workers are black—or own small businesses. Overall, nearly 40 percent of African Americans disapprove of Biden’s performance, a shockingly high number.
Even in the inner cities, the surge of crime, homelessness, and general disorder is leading some, such as in Oakland, to turn on their progressive “benefactors.” Oakland’s progressive district attorney and its socialist-identifying mayor are both facing a recall.
But the most critical shift is occurring among Hispanics, now the country’s largest racial minority. Ironically, Biden’s weak border policies are in part an attempt to placate Latino lobbies, but many Hispanics, particularly near the border, express great concern about unrestricted immigration. After all, like inner-city blacks, they often live in the same areas where undocumented refugees are flocking, putting enormous strain on local resources, and undercutting potential wage gains.
Once considered a linchpin of the “emerging democratic majority,” less than half of Hispanic voters favor the Democrats. Some 54 percent disapprove of Biden’s job as president. Even more than African Americans, Latinos work in the carbon economy. In states like California, much of the population endures high rates of “energy poverty,” and is forced to spend over 10 percent of household income to keep their lights on and homes heated. Recently the California Air Resource Board, the prime implementer of California’s climate regime, has projected that climate policies will force major income declines for people making less than $100,000 a year, but would raise incomes for those above that mark. The racial implications are clear: 60 percent of California low-income households are minorities, largely Hispanic.
The shift to the Right is particularly true in states like Texas, where polling actually has Trump in the lead among Hispanics, and where the vast majority favor increased border security. But it’s not just a Lone Star phenomenon; in 2020, Trump increased his Hispanic support nationwide by eight points. An even stronger shift to the GOP won’t make much difference in states like California or New York, but could greatly help Republicans in contestable states such as Arizona, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Georgia, all centers of Latino growth.
Asian voters, the last element in the “people of color” coalition, also seem to be moving to the Right, with the percentage voting Democratic plunging from 79 percent in 2008 to 64 percent in 2022. Here the issue is largely about upward mobility. Asian Americans, the country’s fastest-growing minority, are particularly affected by and hostile to the Democratic-backed program of affirmative action: one recent national poll found that four in 10 of the group saw affirmative action as “racist” and more than half welcomed a Supreme Court ruling outlawing it.
Like Jewish people before them, Asian Americans have benefited from the end of racial discrimination and the consequent rise of meritocracy. They have the highest per-capita income, lowest per-capita crime rates, and highest rates of college education in the U.S. But instead of praise for having transcended racism, progressives prefer to see Asians as beneficiaries of “white privilege” and dismiss them as “white-adjacent.”
So, minorities (and blue collar whites) aren’t dumb or gullible; rather, their lived experiences are that the Left is undermining their livelihoods and lives with far-left policies disconnected from the impact those policies have on non-degreed Americans, as the Right under Trump is seeking to protect America and its blue collar workers. Whether it is the Left’s open borders allowing nearly ten million illegal immigrants, including criminals and terrorists, into our country; the Green New Deal policies killing jobs and driving everyday costs up; the reckless federal spending pushing inflation and borrowing rates higher; the transradical and woke agendas pushing parents aside as their kids are harmed; or the foreign policy debacles paid for with the blood and injuries of soldiers and drug overdoses from working class families; little of what the Left stands for today benefits any Americans other than the elite and the government dependent.
It isn’t racism driving Trump support. It is the belief he will restore the American Dream to the vast majority of Americans who have been living a nightmare that last few years.
P.S. If you had a neighbor who had a dog that had bitten people in the neighborhood twenty-four times, what do you think would have happened to the dog and the neighbor by now? In most states, the dog would have been labeled a vicious dog requiring it to be put down. The neighbor likely would have been sued by some of the dog’s victims. If you are the Bidens, however, the rules don’t apply to you and your dog. As a result, their German Shepherd—clearly a vicious dog—bite Secret Service agents “at least 24 times” over its life, but has yet to be put down. I presume Joe Biden has immunity for the dog’s bites, but, given the attack on presidential immunity being conducted by the Left against Donald Trump, perhaps Biden will get sued after he departs the White House. It goes without saying that Jill doesn’t have presidential immunity, so she will be at risk for damages at some point.
When it comes to dogs, I once heard a saying that there aren’t stupid dogs, just stupid dog owners. That sounds right to me.
