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Half” wasn’t a gross generalization at all. “Half” was by all indications close to the truth...
Perhaps the best data on questions of race and Trump comes from political scientist Jason McDaniel of San Francisco State University and Sean McElwee, a research associate at Demos, a left-leaning think tank. Using the 2016 pilot of the American National Election Study, conducted in January, they drill down on racial attitudes among Trump supporters. Given what we already know, their results shouldn’t come as a shock. More than 40 percent of all Republicans and more than 60 percent of Trump supporters say that Barack Obama is a Muslim. Compared with those who backed other candidates in the GOP primary, Trump supporters have cooler feelings toward blacks, Hispanics, Muslims, and LGBTQ Americans, and warmer feelings toward whites. By sizable margins, according to McElwee’s analysis of ANES, Trump supporters are more likely than non-Trump supporters to believe that blacks, Hispanics, and Muslims are lazier and more violent than whites. More than 60 percent of Trump supporters believe black people are more violent than whites; nearly 50 percent of non-Trump Republicans say this. More than 70 percent of Trump supporters believe Muslim people are more violent than whites; roughly 60 percent of non-Trump Republicans say this. These are deplorable views, and they represent the consensus opinion not just of Trump supporters but of all Republicans in the survey. If the study is at all reflective of the population at large on this score, we’re going to need a bigger basket.
Which gets to a larger truth: The Republican Party of the Obama years is an ethno-nationalist formation of white Americans. The ideological conservatism of its elites is less important than the raw resentment of its base. Trump has harnessed that and given voice to more virulent forms, to the point where key members of his campaign share neo-Nazi memes on social media.
The dismay over Clinton’s comments—the insistence that it represents some kind of insult and not a statement of truth—reflects the degree to which many of our reporters and observers still shy away from these facts. But this moment demands clarity. Readers don’t need to know whether Clinton made a “gaffe.” They need to know whether she was right. Do millions of Americans hold explicitly racist views? Yes. Do roughly half of Donald Trump’s supporters fall into a so-called “basket of deplorables?” Yes.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2016/09/trump_s_basket_of_deplorables_hillary_clinton_was_right.html
Perhaps the best data on questions of race and Trump comes from political scientist Jason McDaniel of San Francisco State University and Sean McElwee, a research associate at Demos, a left-leaning think tank. Using the 2016 pilot of the American National Election Study, conducted in January, they drill down on racial attitudes among Trump supporters. Given what we already know, their results shouldn’t come as a shock. More than 40 percent of all Republicans and more than 60 percent of Trump supporters say that Barack Obama is a Muslim. Compared with those who backed other candidates in the GOP primary, Trump supporters have cooler feelings toward blacks, Hispanics, Muslims, and LGBTQ Americans, and warmer feelings toward whites. By sizable margins, according to McElwee’s analysis of ANES, Trump supporters are more likely than non-Trump supporters to believe that blacks, Hispanics, and Muslims are lazier and more violent than whites. More than 60 percent of Trump supporters believe black people are more violent than whites; nearly 50 percent of non-Trump Republicans say this. More than 70 percent of Trump supporters believe Muslim people are more violent than whites; roughly 60 percent of non-Trump Republicans say this. These are deplorable views, and they represent the consensus opinion not just of Trump supporters but of all Republicans in the survey. If the study is at all reflective of the population at large on this score, we’re going to need a bigger basket.
Which gets to a larger truth: The Republican Party of the Obama years is an ethno-nationalist formation of white Americans. The ideological conservatism of its elites is less important than the raw resentment of its base. Trump has harnessed that and given voice to more virulent forms, to the point where key members of his campaign share neo-Nazi memes on social media.
The dismay over Clinton’s comments—the insistence that it represents some kind of insult and not a statement of truth—reflects the degree to which many of our reporters and observers still shy away from these facts. But this moment demands clarity. Readers don’t need to know whether Clinton made a “gaffe.” They need to know whether she was right. Do millions of Americans hold explicitly racist views? Yes. Do roughly half of Donald Trump’s supporters fall into a so-called “basket of deplorables?” Yes.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2016/09/trump_s_basket_of_deplorables_hillary_clinton_was_right.html
