Trump’s popularity with his base isn’t the result of economic anxiety, as many claimed in 2016. It’s about race and demographics.

TO UNDERSTAND THE rise of Donald Trump, you don’t need to go to a diner in the Midwest or read “Hillbilly Elegy,” J.D. Vance’s memoir.

You just need to know these basic facts:

In 1980, white people accounted for about 80 percent of the U.S. population.

In 2024, white people account for about 58 percent of the U.S. population.

Trump appeals to white people gripped by demographic hysteria. Especially older white people who grew up when white people represented a much larger share of the population. They fear becoming a minority.

    • draneceusrex@lemmy.world
      10·
      3 months ago

      I guess this is one of the few times American Exceptionalism actually proves right. We’ve always been a melting pot of cultures. That includes many different “white” cultures for a good few centuries, but go ahead and ask the Irish and Italian immigrants if they didn’t feel like minorities as they were coming off the boats to Ellis Island. Even next to the oppression and brutality both Native and Black Americans faced, their contributions to our society are innumerable and invaluable. The new immigrants coming from Latin America are just being played for political gain while we appreciate and depend on their willingness to work our farms and construction sites. Their kids are just as adapted to American culture as mine are, just as every second generation of immigrants turns out to be. We stress a huge amount about racism (and yes we still have a long way to go, as Trump shows) but when you really compare us to other countries, we seem to be doing alright. The melting pot will keep going, even once us white people are under 50% of the population.

      • Novman
        14·
        3 months ago

        I think that you overextimate the american exceptionalism. In the xx century the europe was destroyed in the ww leaving the usa as the only state not touched by the wars. The rest of the world was lagging techlogicaly. Now the situation is different. Usa is a young country and it is not different from any other.

        • draneceusrex@lemmy.world
          5·
          3 months ago

          11 aircraft carriers, the dollar being the fiat currency of the world, and our cultural dominance pretty much seals the hegemony win for the US since the '90s, but ok, sure dude. We’re no different than other countries…

          • Novman
            21·
            3 months ago

            To be an empire doesn’t mean be different

    • thedirtyknapkin@lemmy.world
      91·
      3 months ago

      white people aren’t even close to becoming a minority, we’re just approaching a point that no race is the majority. there will still be more white people than any other race here for a long long time, and when that changes it’s only going to be because of racial mixing and a loss of racial identity or the birth of a new one. white people will not be a minority just because they become less than 50% of the population. they will lose some of the privilege they have and that may feel like oppression to them, but they will not become a minority.