Why do they love
him? Let me count the ways. They love him to the depth, and breadth, and height
the mind can reach because he has promised to return the White Race to
preeminence in America. Of all the reasons why Trump supporters love their guy,
this is the biggest. When he proclaimed that the Latin-American immigrants were
rapists and criminals, right-wing Republicans perked-up their ears and thought
“I love this guy.” When he said that some of the Neo-Nazis, KKK, and White Supremacists
in Charlottesville were “Very fine people” they loved it. When he lambasted
Black football players for kneeling during the National Anthem, they cheered. Hillary Clinton called many of the Trump
supporters “Deplorables.” I call them bigots.
These
people have heard or read that eventually white people will become a minority
in America. This really scares them. They are frightened that people of color
will become a majority and that they will take places with whites. Trump has
not-so-subtly argued that he will prevent that.
Some
years ago when I was talking with a group of young Republicans, they asked me
why I was a Democrat. I told them that I had been brought-up as a Republican
but that I was converted to the Democratic party by John Kennedy. I said that
Kennedy was the first president to forcefully oppose racial segregation in
America. They looked blankly at me and said “So?” To them that was hardly a
reason to switch from Republican to Democrat. They did not feel anything for the
terrible prejudice faced by African Americans in the 1960s. Those were the days
of Jim Crow, lynchings, burnings, hangings, and separation of the races,
particularly in schools and throughout the South. They were unconcerned about
the suffering of Blacks from official and unofficial bigotry in both the North
and the South.
While
subsequent presidents have opposed racial discrimination, the first African
American president brought the issue to the forefront, and apparently that
outraged the Republicans who continue to despise Blacks. They had never
imagined that a Black man could become president. They considered African
Americans a inferior race and assumed that one could never assume the
presidency. They found themselves voting for Donald Trump, a New York real
estate developer who made it clear that he did not support the rights of
minorities.
The
second great reason for the love Trump supporters have for their president is
partially connected to the first. The great outpouring of care and concern for
the rights of African Americans during the past seventy years has been by
political liberals. Although liberals have been found in both parties, after
the presidency of John Kennedy they began to drift toward the Democratic Party.
Likewise, the conservatives drifted into the Republican Party.
Liberals tend to
be better educated and more affluent than Republicans. A look at post-electoral
maps indicate that less prosperous parts of America, such as Southern states and
farm states, were the places most strongly for Donald Trump. He won North-Eastern
states like Wisconsin and Ohio because the less-educated blue-collar voters,
who were previously Democrat voters, strongly supported Trump. Those voters
liked it that Trump seemed to be sticking a thumb into the eyes of the
“Elites.” They appreciated that Trump attacked political correctness. Those
people resented the elites because they perceived that the elites looked down
on the less educated and less privileged working class Americans. They
perceived that Hillary Clinton was an elite.
A third reason why
Trump has so many supporters is that a very large group of people consider
abortion the most important issue in America. There is, of course, an overlap
with the people described above, but anti-abortionists are probably the most
avid Trump supporters because he has signaled his opposition to abortion and
his intent to appoint anti-abortion justices to the Supreme Court.
Many liberals
contend that the war against aborting is really a war against the rights of
women. Demographics indicate that the strongest group against former president
Obama was white men. Likewise, white women were among his strongest supporters.
Many liberals feel that the effort to stop abortion is part of the effort to
get women barefoot and back in the kitchen. Many men and some women resent the
highly educated career-oriented women.
The evangelical crowd
overlaps with the anti-abortionists and could be considered the fourth large
group of devoted Trump supporters. They are also anti-abortion, but their
concerns go beyond abortion. They strongly oppose modern feminism, and can
quote for the Bible Paul’s instructions for wives to be subservient to their
husbands. Evangelicals believe that all of the problems in America are being
caused by the absence of religion. They believe America was founded as a Christian
nation and that other religions should not have the same rights as Christians under
the First Amendment. They want to be able to practice Christianity in public
places. They have been sharply restricted by the courts in their public
profession of faith. They want prayer in the schools, but the Supreme Court has
declared such prayers unconstitutional. Trump has spoken-up for their concerns
and they look to him to support their desire to cram Christianity down the
throats of all Americans.
These Trump supporters
do not care whether Trump has the skill or ability to be a good president. They
do not care if he is in cahoots with Vladimir Putin, or if he was taken-in by
Kim Jong Un. They do not care if he lies repeatedly, or if he demonstrates
ignorance of important facts. They do not care that he is a bully. They do not
care that he is egotistical, paranoid, megalomaniacal, and mean spirited. They
do not care that he had illicit affairs with a porn star and a former Playboy
Bunny, lied about them, and had the women paid-off. They do not care that Trump
has fired most of his original cabinet and staff members and taken on
right-wing extremists in their place. They care about the issues described
above.
