Trump has been called a racist; So why do increasing numbers of black and Latino voters support him now?

There is a certain predictability to Donald Trump’s rallies. A sea of ​​red ‘Make America Great Again’ hats, tons of Stars and Stripes flags, and an enthusiastic crowd of predominantly white, working-class fans who make up his loyal base.

But in recent months there has been a notable shift in people turning out to cheer on the former president as he campaigns from North Carolina to Nevada and Arizona to Arkansas in his bid to return to the White House in November’s presidential election.

Increasingly, his supporters wear “Blacks for Trump” T-shirts and brandish “Latinos for Trump” signs alongside their traditional supporters, and their numbers grow every week.

Recent polls have shown that working-class minorities, who historically vote for the Democratic Party led by President Joe Biden, are turning their backs en masse. An AP-NORC poll showed that only 50 percent of Black adults said they approved of Biden, down from 86 percent in July 2021. At the same time, 25 percent of Black adults said they approved of Trump , compared to 18 percent. cent in 2021.

Craig Scott, 54, a black filmmaker and Trump supporter from North Carolina, is not the least bit surprised. “At the end of the day, people vote with their wallets and no one can argue that life in America today is better under Biden than under Trump. A trip to the grocery store or gas station hits people where it hurts most. Biden is old and out of touch. Ask most people if they were better off under Trump and the answer is “yes.”

Facing multiple lawsuits over everything from voter fraud to tax evasion – what Trump describes as “a political witch hunt” – has ironically endeared him to minority voters.

Scott, who joined a black militant group as a teenager in the 1980s and was jailed for 26 years for robbing a white-owned bank and depositing money he stole in a black-owned bank, said: “Black communities They are used to feeling persecuted. When Trump’s mugshot was released, many of us felt sympathy for him.

“His run-ins with the law and what seems like an unfair obsession with putting him behind bars remind us of what they have historically done to us.”

For Latinos, predominantly immigrants from Mexico and Central and South America, the decision to support Trump is more personal. It’s a reaction against Biden’s disastrous “open borders” policies, which have seen 7.3 million migrants illegally cross the US southern border since he took office, according to official US Customs and Border Protection figures. .

There are 36.2 million eligible Hispanic voters in 2024, up from 32.3 million in the 2020 election. Latinos now make up nearly 15 percent of the U.S. electorate and will likely hold the key to whoever wins in November, particularly in states key like Arizona and Nevada, which Biden narrowly won in 2020.

In January, a USA Today/Suffolk University poll showed Trump leading with 39 percent among Latino voters, compared to Biden’s 24 percent, a massive drop since the 2020 election, when Bidden won the 65 percent of the Latino votes.

Texas dentist Alma Arrendondo-Lynch, 67, participated in the “Take Our Border Back” demonstration: “I’m not against people coming to the United States, but they should do it legally,” she said.

Another woman who came to Los Angeles 20 years ago from El Salvador and who preferred not to give her name, said: ‘It took me years and thousands of dollars to get a Green Card and US citizenship. It is wrong that Biden is allowing millions of illegals to arrive. Why should they be given work visas and allowed to stay when they haven’t followed the same rules as the rest of us?

‘It is our communities that are suffering because of these illegals. They are taking resources away from poor areas. Our schools cannot cope, our hospitals cannot cope. “That’s why I vote for Trump.”

Professor Taylor Dark of California State University’s political science department said people shouldn’t be surprised that minorities support Trump.

He said: ‘Many predominantly working-class Black and Latino people feel that Biden is not prioritizing their interests. Economically they feel worse with Biden.

‘The Democratic Party is dominated by college-educated people and its focus on issues like trans rights does not align with the views of these working-class groups. They are off.

‘Many blacks and Latinos do not like the magnitude of illegal immigration. They don’t like it in principle and see illegal immigrants as people who will potentially take away their jobs. “These minority groups are turning to Trump for the same reasons that the white working classes embraced him in 2016.”

Neither blacks nor Latinos seem bothered by claims that Trump is a racist who once declared that he didn’t want immigrants from Haiti, Africa and “other shithole countries.” “Trump is not perfect and he has said stupid things and been photographed with stupid people, but I don’t care about that,” said a film executive member of the group “Blacks For Trump.”

‘This is a fight for America. When he was president, Trump introduced prison reforms that helped Black communities, provided grants to Black colleges and gave stimulus checks to promote Black-owned small businesses. What has Biden done for us?

“Biden talks the talk, but he is a limousine liberal who has done nothing of real importance to change the lives of ordinary black people in this country. We have traditionally voted Democratic, but Barack Obama disappointed many.

‘He came to the White House offering change and hope, but nothing changed. Black people are tired of being fed lies. “Trump can’t do worse than Biden.”

Trump has said he is considering Tim Scott, the first black senator from South Carolina in the historically racially divided Deep South, as a possible vice presidential running mate. Scott, who briefly opposed Trump before dropping out of the race to be the Republican nominee, dismissed Trump’s legal troubles and past racist remarks, saying, “The American people are more focused on the future than they are on their past.”