The first waves of panic are starting to take over the Harris-Walz presidential campaign and Team Trump is starting to believe that maybe their man might win after all.
Momentum is back with Donald Trump and Kamala Harris’ campaign is an increasingly disgruntled and shaky ship with less than three weeks to go.
But Democrats are being forced to confront something even more existential than the possibility of defeat on Nov. 5: that perhaps, for them, demographics are not their party’s destiny after all.
It has long been a comforting axiom of Democratic thought that the more non-white the United States becomes, the more the Democrats are destined to be the natural party of government. After all, Democrats are supported by a comfortable majority of Hispanic and Asian voters, as well as an overwhelming majority of black voters.
The more these minorities unite into a new American majority, the more Democrats can hope to win elections. For the progressive wing of the party, he promised the definitive triumph of identity politics: making race the most important trait that defines people and future Democratic victories are in the bag.
The first waves of panic are starting to take over the Harris-Walz presidential campaign and Team Trump is starting to believe that maybe their man might win after all.
Momentum is back with Donald Trump and Kamala Harris’ campaign is an increasingly disgruntled and shaky ship with less than three weeks to go.
Except for one thing Democratic strategists never saw coming: Americans of color are steadily moving to the right.
It’s ironic that Democrats only realized this in the midst of their first presidential election with a non-white candidate at the helm, which many in the party thought would seal its demographic fate.
The fact that they never saw it coming is illustrated by how they flail around trying to deal with it.
That Harris has a problem with black male voters has become clear the longer the campaign has gone on. Barack Obama was wheeled last week to Pittsburgh (the second-largest conurbation in the most crucial of the swing states, Pennsylvania) to admonish black men for their lack of enthusiasm for Harris.
Too many black men, the former president opined, “don’t feel the idea of having a woman as president,” in a clumsy intervention that did more harm than good.
When it comes to winning people’s votes, it’s probably not a good idea to portray them as sexist, even misogynistic. Ignoring what might really explain black men’s disillusionment with Democrats—slow wage growth, high housing costs, crime-ridden streets—might even be considered an insult.
Harris hasn’t fared much better. She rushed to be interviewed in several black-targeted media outlets, brandishing so-called forgivable loans (the kind you probably won’t have to repay) for minority small businesses and the federal decriminalization of cannabis.
This meant that black men’s votes could be bought with a mixture of cash and marijuana, which was degrading as well as offensive.
No wonder Jim Clyburn, the veteran Black Democratic congressman from South Carolina who saved Joe Biden’s eventful 2020 primary campaign, said he remained seriously “concerned about Black men staying home or voting for Trump” on November 5.
The problem is real and it is increasing. Surprisingly, Harris has less support among black voters in this presidential election than Hillary Clinton did when she lost to Trump in 2016.
A recent New York Times/Siena College poll was stark in describing the rightward drift among minority voters, especially men, especially men without college degrees.
Among non-college-educated black voters in 2016, Democrats won by a margin of nearly 90 percentage points. This year, that figure has dropped to 65 percent, according to the NYT survey.
The Democratic loss among Hispanic voters is even greater: Eight years ago, Democrats had a 41 percentage point advantage over the GOP among non-college-educated Hispanics; now it is projected to be only 16 percent.
The Democratic loss among Hispanic voters is even greater: Eight years ago, Democrats had a 41 percentage point advantage over the GOP among non-college-educated Hispanics; that figure is now projected to be just 16 percent.
Of course, a majority of people of color will still vote Democratic on November 5, but not with the traditional landslide majorities that Democrats typically enjoy and need to ensure overall victory.
Polls show that one in five black voters, two in five Hispanic voters and one in three voters of Asian descent are now seriously disillusioned with Democrats. Four years ago, Biden could count on 89 percent of the black vote in key states. Harris’ poll share is currently at 78 percent.
With less than a percentage point now separating the two presidential contenders in the seven swing states, that degree of minority defection from Democrats could be crucial to ensuring Trump’s victory.
Some will see this as a welcome comeuppance for Democrats and their obsession with identity politics. But the Democratic mistake was not so much trusting too much in identity as choosing the mistaken identity.
It turns out that social class matters more than race among ordinary minority voters, contrary to recent fashionable academic theories and the airy forecasts of Democratic Party panjandrums.
Minority voters without a college education share the same economic frustrations, even anger, as white working-class voters, which is why many are drawn to Trump.
White and non-white working-class voters believe their wages rose faster under Trump than under Biden. Only 21 percent of Hispanic voters believe that Biden has helped them get ahead; but 38 percent believe Trump did.
Minority disillusionment with Democrats is not helped by the growing perception that the party is in the hands of a wealthy metropolitan elite who do not share the values of ordinary minority voters who, it turns out, have more class solidarity. with working-class whites than with Democrats. elegant people who now run the party they have voted for until now.
This points to perhaps the biggest mistake of all made by the Democratic elite: They proceeded to reshape the party on the basis that voters of color were overwhelmingly progressive, like them. While in reality, minority voters are more likely to be moderate to conservative.
White and non-white working-class voters believe their wages rose faster under Trump than under Biden. Only 21 percent of Hispanic voters believe that Biden has helped them get ahead; but 38 percent believe Trump did.
They are tough on crime because they are more likely to be victims than wealthy whites.
They are not interested in transgender rights, especially when it comes to allowing biological males to compete in women’s sports.
They tend to be isolationists in foreign policy, preferring that money be spent on their problems at home rather than on military adventures abroad in which minorities will disproportionately participate in the fighting and end up filling a high percentage of the body bags.
The Biden administration thought that what Hispanic voters wanted and were duly obligated to was looser controls at the southern border. It shows how disconnected he was.
Working-class Hispanics, along with other minority voters, want strict border controls because their jobs – not those of the metropolitan elite – are the ones at risk from uncontrolled illegal immigration. Which explains why 40 percent of black and Hispanic voters think all illegal immigrants should be deported and support building a border wall.
It’s almost as if Trump’s agenda was crafted with minority voters in mind.
It’s baffling that Democratic Party strategists didn’t see this coming. After all, it’s happened before. The backbone of the Democratic Party used to be blue-collar Americans of Irish, Italian, and Polish descent. But over time, as they increased their participation in American society, they became more conservative.
Some even started voting Republican. They were instrumental in Ronald Reagan’s two presidential victories in 1980 and 1984. As a former Democrat, he himself proudly called them the Reagan Democrats.
I remember sitting in a sawdust bar in upstate New York during the 1980 campaign. The clientele was clearly blue-collar. A photograph of John F. Kennedy hung proudly behind the bar.
“I guess people here will vote Democrat when the election comes around,” I told the waiter.
“Oh no,” he replied. ‘I’m voting Republican. Most of us are.
His clients nodded in approval. It was then, in what was a close election, that I realized that Reagan would probably win.
That same phenomenon is happening now, this time with minority voters. It may not yet be enough to ensure Trump’s victory, as the rightward drift of minority voters is a process that is just beginning. And Harris’ “man problem” coincides with Trump’s “woman problem.”
But the minority drift is causing Harris and her party endless problems. Whatever the outcome on November 5, Democrats can no longer take minority voters for granted, and their prospects of becoming the natural party of government are rapidly diminishing.