Why America voted for Trump, a simple, sane summary

[Bippy2024]

This is why Trump won so resoundingly - this is why 72 million Americans voted for him - in one of his voter's own words.

If you choose to monster and slur 72 million people, that's saying a lot about you. Every accusation is a confession.

"I know a lot of people who voted for Trump. Let me tell you their reasons.
They wanted a return to normalcy. Gender ideology is just too out there. They want to protect women and children.

The economy has been disastrous for them. They didn’t have a cushion to absorb the inflation. They are cutting out everything in their lives just to afford food. And some are cutting that out.

Their lives have gotten very small. When they tried to tell you, they were told they shouldn’t splurge on things like a frozen pizza.

They see people coming illegally into this country and being handed stuff. Their stuff. Their money is being handed over. They have nothing. They watch as others are just handed more than they have.

They can’t afford rent and don’t know what to do. More people fighting for the same housing units makes prices rise.

They see a frightening turn towards censorship. They value the first amendment. Remember, it’s very important. They are so tired of being lied to and called terrible names.

Every time the mainstream media made up a story to make people hysterical they rolled their eyes. This pushed more and more people away. They stopped having any faith in the media. A firing squad? Really?

They feel the hysteria is toxic and frightening. Again they want this all to calm down.

They watch as political protests are punished for only one side. They see crime running rampant.

They see the people who try to protect us from crime being punished. The criminals go free to re-offend.

Essentially, they want their children to be healthy, they want their family to be fed, they don’t want endless war, they want things to be fair, they want the bad guys punished and the good guys appreciated, they want to protect women and children.

I hope if you are frightened today you will hear me. I hope I can help you see that things are not dire. I hope I can help you see that these were regular everyday folks who want regular everyday things. Food, clothing, shelter, privacy, respect for boundaries.

That’s it. Just those things. Peace."

https://x.com/babybeginner/status/1854179213399502850

"The point of keeping immigration levels high is to keep wages low"

Migration will always be a fact of life in a world where we have countries with falling birthrates, ageing populations, enormous wealth and high need for labour, and other countries mired in poverty and conflict with a young workforce.

People will always migrate to make a better life for themselves if they feel that is their only option.

And this will increase as climate instability ratchets up conflict and agricultural failure in the equatorial regions of the earth.

This is a good podcast which unpicks some of the central issues around immigration - the stuff that's politically unpalatable.

open.spotify.com/episode/2MKW6ZHVu4uy0dyNct2o2C?si=leroDTEvQMWRgpeq037EOQ

If you're going to argue that 'immigration depresses wages' you also have to accept that it also depresses food prices - unless you're genuinely going to argue that deporting vast numbers of agricultural labourers and replacing them with US citizens on a national minimum wage (say $15 an hour) will have no meaningful impact on either food production costs or inflation?

BTW - can't speak for the US but the evidence from the UK on the impact of immigration on wages suggests it's actually pretty minimal, and where you see the highest impact it tends to affect recent immigrant workers themselves most significantly. Of course we have a fairly reasonable minimum wage in the uk and a stronger welfare state, both things the libertarian nut jobs just elected in the US are strongly opposed to.

@LilyBartsHatShop - 'Economics 101'? 😂

It's not though.

"I'm saying, they're not xenophobic. They're observing the connection between immigration and wages that every economist on the planet acknowledges"

migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/the-labour-market-effects-of-immigration/

You've clearly only accessed information that backs up your belief that the poorest people in any nation are reasonable in blaming their poverty primarily on immigrant workers.

Because it's easier to despise and blame poor brown people than it is to criticise the economic system that tolerates a minimum wage way too low to live on, or corporations that care more for their shareholders than their workers.

@izimbra Yes you're right having a minimum wage does make a difference. I wasn't thinking of that because of U.S. context - very few states have a minimum wage (do any?).
I'm not sure why the laughter emoji? Just looking at your podcast link, the first quote from Professor Hein de Haas is, “Immigration is the price you pay for being a wealthy market economy. That’s the bottom line.”
It looks to me like working class people, whose wages haven't increased in decades, believe they are no longer benefitting from being part of a wealthy market economy.

You seem to be convinced that actually they are xenophobic bigots. But why can Professor Hein de Haas observe the role that immigration plays in our economy, but not an ordinary, low wage worker?

Yes, the professor thinks it's all going well enough for everyone who gets to be part of the wealthy market economy.
Workers with stagnated wages disagree.
I don't know what will happen if Trump tries to really curtail immigration. Or illegal immigration, for that matter. Maybe the tide will go out and everyone will be that much worse off for it and the low wage workers will have shot themselves in the foot.
I'm not saying their solution would work - I don't know if it would or not.

I'm saying I don't understand why it's attributed to xenophobia when working class people observe the connection between wages and immigration. But not when economists do.

@izimbra what makes you think workers with stagnated wages "despise and blame brown people" ?
Wages have stagnated in western economies. Immigration does have a role in supressing wages.
There are plenty of low wage workers who are attracted by the idea of curtailing immigration to try and help boost their wages.
I'm not saying I think this tactic will work. We don't have alot of evidence to go on because there hasn't been much variety in economic strategy in the west for a while now.
What I'm curious to know is why you go to racism and xenophobia as an explanation for why people whose wages have stagnated for decades now see immigration as playing a role in wage suppression? When the relationship between immigration and wage suppresion is a feature of neoliberal economics, not a bug?

@LilyBartsHatShop

I think it would be truly evil if Trump's protectionist strategies involve rounding up migrants and sending them to death camps. I don't believe that is at all likely, and I'm not completely comfortable using the holocaust to make points like this. It feels like hyperbole, but hyperbole on a subject that should be treated more carefully.

I think you need to be wary when someone starts to dehumanise and demonise a whole group. This sets a scene where people will basically have less empathy for how they will be treated. Things trump has said about illegal immigrants that have no basis in fact are;

They are attacking villages
They are eating people's pets
Venezuelan gangs are taking over some city.
Governments are emptying insane asylum's and prisons and sending them to the US.
The Venezuelan government is sending criminal gangs here.
That 13,000 murders came in under Biden.
They are stealing jobs.
They are voting illegally

Trump isn't really the main problem or threat. It's the Heritage Foundation and Project 2025 that is the real thing to be worried about.

OP, I read the list you wrote out of interest. I can see how those who voted for Trump would think that. Although I disagree, it does help me to understand that.

@mollyfolk Probably good to be reminded of the bonkers things Trump says. I forget because it's all so weird and melodramatic. But maybe I'm wrong and it's more deliberate and purposeful than that, and Trump really will commit atrocities against some of these people he rails against.
Also I think I disagree with you on the "stealing jobs" point.
I don't think illegal immigrants are stealing anyone's jobs. But they are willing to do menial jobs at very low wages, which has an effect on the wages of all working class people. But I'm going to stop banging on about this here becase I've written reams on it already! And I'm quite willing to agree to disagree with people because this is all being tentatively thought out for me.

@Bippy2024 If the wall was built it’s been a spectacular Trump failure! So entirely glossed over.

Of course some uk citizens don’t want immigration. Often immigrants themselves not that many years ago. It’s protectionism.

Damn Straight!

I think you are probably right op. Whether he will be able to deliver the things those people want is another thing.

I've just watched Dr. Grande on YouTube airing his opinion on the US election result.

I know from his previous videos that he disliked both Trump & Harris as candidates so he puts his non-partisan views across in a measured and calm manner. I'm posting the link because he identifies some factors that I had neither considered nor seen mentioned on the many MN election threads.

@LilyBartsHatShop I agree it isn’t racist or xenophobic to be concerned about immigration. I share that concern. But I think where it tips over is where Trump and his supporters use language thats very dehumanising and othering when they talk about immigrants. The island of trash or the eating cats and dogs or the criminals and rapists comments. That’s what sounds xenophobic and racist. It should be possible to have stringent immigration requirements and a rigorous asylum process without losing a sense of common humanity.

It's not clear if immigration lowers wages. So not every economist agrees with this at all, in fact most studies don't show that. But I don't think anyone would disagree that immigration should take place using a rules based system and happen in an orderly fashion. But the answer to that isn't simple.

Trump offered simple solutions to complex problems. And that's what we all want, a simple answer to our problems. I don't know what the answer is. I do think politicians should learn to speak in plain English. Trump speaks simply and uses short words. The media often pokes fun at him for this. But it's one of his greatest assets, every politician should pitch their language at a level that everyone can understand.

There HAS NOT been a swing to Trump
and any analysis predicated on there having been one
will fail.
On this page you can click back and forth through the different elections
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_presidential_election
In 2024 Trump has 74,650,754 as at now
In 2020 he got 74,223,975

In 2024 Harris has 70,916,946 as at now
In 2020 Biden got 81,283,501

Around ten million Democrat voters stayed home.
They did not move to Trump
They did not vote at all.
WHY ?????

They did vote, as down ballot results show. Democrats did okay in state and local elections that were also on the ballot. They either voted for Trump or didn't vote for either.

Democrats were united and turned out. Harris lost anyway. - Voters issued a broad repudiation of not only Harris’ campaign but the Democratic Party’s vision for the country.

What simply solutions has Trump proposed?

@MissConductUS
Focussing on "vote share" is misleading though
because the number of Democrat votes cast dropped while the number of Republican stayed stable.
New York - 1 million less Democrats, only 200k more Republican

Did people leave the top line of the ballot blank while filling in the lower boxes ?

Trump speaks simply and uses short words. The media often pokes fun at him for this.

He doesn't have fun poked at him for speaking simply and using short words. He has fun poked at him for talking absolute bollocks - eg, that bizarre stream of consciousness about sharks and batteries. He also gets justifiably criticised for the dehumanizing language he uses to describe immigrants.

I think that's exactly what a lot of them did.

"Trump speaks simply and uses short words."

Trump engages is demagoguery, like every popular fascist leader over the past 100 years.

Rambling xenophobic rants will always be popular with audiences who believe that foreigners and migrants are responsible for almost everything that's wrong with their country. Crime. Housing. Public spending. Cultural 'dilution' etc etc.

I think the woman who tweeted the statement above was telling the absolute truth, as she sees it.

Probably but there are the other 71m people who voted for Trump, plus the democrats who didn't vote.

Also I in my post was telling the absolute truth as I see it about finding your manner abrasive. Yet your response was to tell me I didn't really think that and / or had no right to 'police' your speech. (And then to try to wind me up by doing the thing I said I found annoying, to me).

Finally you say I 'keep' doing this. It was actually my only post in the thread, which I will now hide so you can go on being annoying without further interference from me.

@Cnon

The economy has NOT 'crashed' under Biden, and Trump's economy simply followed a trajectory set by Obama.

There was high inflation in all developed economies following the pandemic, which has resulted in all incumbents doing worse in this years elections. Biden bought inflation down faster & further than other G7 countries.

In fact last week "Sixteen Nobel Prize-winning economists have signed a public letter in advance of Thursday’s presidential debate endorsing President Biden’s economic policies and criticizing Donald Trump’s"

You need to step outside of your Republican bubble and smell the coffee.

He also gets poked fun at for saying things like very bad, huge and very very bad and basically having an extremely limited vocabulary.

Which is a separate issue to his rhetoric and his ramblings.

I'm not suggesting every politician starts to speak like trump. But there is a lot to be said for plain English and being mindful of the fact that many Americans have basic literacy levels.