Why Black People Voted For Trump

President Donald Trump increased his share of the black vote from 8% in 2016 to 12% in 2020.

This week on 51/49, James breaks down why African Americans and other minorities voted for Trump in larger numbers in 2020 and what it can tell us about the future of electoral politics.

The first explanation centers around the fact that racism is not a wedge issue for everyone, including minority voters. In the context of how people cast their vote, people vote for different reasons and that there is no universal wedge issue—for some racism is key issue, for the others it might be the economy or maybe other cultural issues like abortion.

Second, the Democratic Party has long been known as the party of minorities but in recent years, but over the past several decades, they have largely failed to deliver anything meaningful to those communities. Trump, in 2016 and now in 2020, at least made an attempt to appeal to the economic needs of African Americans with proposals like the “platinum plan” that touted increasing capital in black communities by $500 billion dollars. Meanwhile, the Democrats offered nothing more than “restoring the soul of this nation”.

0:00 Introduction
1:03 Racism is Not a Wedge Issue
2:55 Racism Permeates Through Our Society
5:20 Soul of the Nation vs. The Platinum Plan
7:24 Is There an Electoral Realignment on the Horizon?

51/49 with James Li - Commentary on business, politics, and the other things (from an independent perspective)

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