2016: Pick Your Poison
It’s no secret that racism exists. Stereotypes, biases, and prejudices are still prevalent throughout American culture. Donald Trump has seemingly spurred support from certain social groups who tend to represent these less-than-savory ideals, while Hilary Clinton has been struggling with younger voters and white males. But how important are these social cleavages? Pollard would argue that these social cleavages have defined the voting trends for each candidate this year. With regards to voting for Donald Trump, Pollard asserts that “racial and ethnocentric attitudes will matter more in this election than if Trump was not the GOP nominee” (Pollard 9). But are these people voting for Trump due to his policies or because of their social group? Achen and Bartels believe that “voting behavior is primarily a product of inherited partisan loyalties, social identities and symbolic attachments” (Achen and Bartels 1-2). They found that many younger Bernie supporters are more loyal to the image that goes along with Sanders rather than his policies, just as many Trump supporters side with the idea of an anti-immigration, racist candidate.
Adam Enders and Steven Smallpage also found that racism will play a larger part in this election than normal, and that “high levels of racial resentment are correlated with supporting Trump” (Enders and Smallpage 3). Supporters of Donald Trump have been statistically found to be more racist than Clinton supporters, further perpetrating the image of Trump as a racist and pushing the minority vote toward Clinton. However, Clinton has been struggling to gain the support of white males as argued by Matt Flegenheimer. Flegenheimer notes that white men prefer Trump to Clinton in nearly a 2:1 ratio. Each candidate in the upcoming presidential election has their own social groups supporting them based on their individual public perception. Presidential candidates often attempt to reach out to the social groups that support their opposing candidate. However, these attempts are largely unsuccessful due to the inherent social identities that people wish to align themselves with being reflected in the candidate they already support.
It’s time to ask if there’s anything more cringeworthy than Donald Trump attempting to appeal to Hispanic voters.
Yup. Hilary Clinton attempting to appeal to young voters.
