Ezra Klein: Economic Anxiety Didn't Drive Racial Fears in White Americans; Other Way Around

In Vox.com, Ezra Klein writes a compelling article showing that what happened in 2016 was NOT a bad economy suddenly making working class whites open to the race-baiting and anti-immigrant rhetoric of Donald Trump. It was the other way around.  The racial fears came first and the more a person was afraid of the browning of America and the coming “disaster” when whites drop from a majority of the population to simply a plurality and largest minority, the worse they believed the economy was. They were convinced that Trump was right that the “real unemployment” was at least double what the official numbers were. Once Trump was elected, his supporters became the most economically optimistic—whether or not their own circumstances got better.

America has yet to face the deep seated nature of racism in this nation. The election of Obama didn’t lead to deep conversations on race—instead they led many moderate and liberal whites to think we were going into a “post-racial America.” Some of them joined those who were alarmed at Obama’s presence in the White House when a post-racial America didn’t magically appear.  

Until we address the deep seated nature of American racism, we will continue to be vulnerable to demagogues like Trump and to espionage attacks by Russia and maybe others.