The Anger Games: Who Voted for Donald Trump in the 2016 Election, and Why?

2018 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Norman Smith ◽  
Eric Hanley
Keyword(s):  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Election Study ◽  
Multivariate Logistic Regression ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
College Degrees ◽  
National Election Study ◽  
White Voters ◽  
American National Election Study ◽  
2016 Election ◽  
Definite Structure

Recently released data from the 2016 American National Election Study allow us to offer a multifaceted profile of white voters who voted for Donald J. Trump in the 2016 presidential election. We find that Trump’s supporters voted for him mainly because they share his prejudices, not because they’re financially stressed. It’s true, as exit polls showed, that voters without four-year college degrees were likelier than average to support Trump. But millions of these voters—who are often stereotyped as “the white working class”—opposed Trump because they oppose his prejudices. These prejudices, meanwhile, have a definite structure, which we argue should be called authoritarian: negatively, they target minorities and women; and positively, they favor domineering and intolerant leaders who are uninhibited about their biases. Multivariate logistic regression shows that, once we take these biases into account, demographic factors (age, education, etc.) lose their explanatory power. The electorate, in short, is deeply divided. Nearly 75% of Trump supporters count themselves among his enthusiastic supporters, and even “mild” Trump voters are much closer in their attitudes to Trump’s enthusiasts than they are to non-Trump voters. Polarization is profound, and may be growing.

scholarly journals Economic Populism and Bandwagon Bigotry: Obama-to-Trump Voters and the Cross Pressures of the 2016 Election

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 237802311987111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen L. Morgan ◽  
Jiwon Lee
Keyword(s):  
Racial Attitudes ◽  
Alternative Explanation ◽  
Electoral College ◽  
Party Affiliation ◽  
Election Study ◽  
Economic Interests ◽  
Economic Vulnerability ◽  
National Election Study ◽  
American National Election Study ◽  
2016 Election

Through an analysis of validated voters in the 2016 American National Election Study, this article considers the voters who supported Obama in 2012 and Trump in 2016. More than 5.7 million in total, Obama-to-Trump voters were crucial to Trump’s victory in the Electoral College. They were more likely to be white, working class, and resident in the Midwest. They had lower levels of political interest, were centrist in both party affiliation and ideology, and were late deciders for the 2016 election. On economic interests, they were centrists, except for trade policy, which they viewed, on average, as a greater threat than other voters. They claimed to have more experience with economic vulnerability than Democratic loyalists of comparable social standing. On racial attitudes, including the racialized economic topic of immigration, they had a profile similar to Republican loyalists. While their support of Trump may be attributable to surging white nativism, this article argues for an alternative explanation. Voters who were attracted by Trump’s economic populism only joined his coalition if they could accept his racialized rhetoric. As a result, the Trump bandwagon predominantly attracted generically bigoted voters with racial attitudes similar to Republican loyalists.

scholarly journals Economic Populism and Bandwagon Bigotry: Obama-to-Trump Voters and the Cross Pressures of the 2016 Election

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen L. Morgan ◽  
Jiwon Lee
Keyword(s):  
Racial Attitudes ◽  
Alternative Explanation ◽  
Electoral College ◽  
Party Affiliation ◽  
Election Study ◽  
Economic Interests ◽  
Economic Vulnerability ◽  
National Election Study ◽  
American National Election Study ◽  
2016 Election

Through an analysis of validated voters in the 2016 American National Election Study, this article considers the voters who supported Obama in 2012 and Trump in 2016. More than 5.7 million in total, Obama-to-Trump voters were essential to Trump’s victory in the Electoral College. They were more likely to be white, working class, and resident in the Midwest. They had lower levels of political interest, were centrist in both party affiliation and ideology, and were late deciders for the 2016 election. On economic interests, they were centrists, except for trade policy, which they viewed, on average, as a greater threat than other voters. They claimed to have more experience with economic vulnerability than Democratic loyalists of comparable social standing. On racial attitudes, including the racialized economic topic of immigration, they had a profile similar to Republican loyalists. While their support of Trump may be attributable to surging white nativism, this article argues for an alternative explanation. Voters who were attracted by Trump’s economic populism only joined his coalition if they could accept his racialized rhetoric. As a result, the Trump bandwagon predominantly attracted generically bigoted voters with racial attitudes similar to Republican loyalists.

scholarly journals The Hillary Hypotheses: Testing Candidate Views of Loss

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 646-665 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael S. Lewis-Beck ◽  
Stephen Quinlan
Keyword(s):  
National Election ◽  
Comprehensive Assessment ◽  
Hypotheses Testing ◽  
Election Study ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
National Election Study ◽  
Hillary Rodham Clinton ◽  
American National Election Study ◽  
Electoral Defeat ◽  
E Mail

The surprising election of Donald Trump to the presidency calls for a comprehensive assessment of what motivated voters to opt for a controversial political novice rather than a provocative but experienced political veteran. Our study provides a novel exploration of the Trump victory through the prism of the defeated candidate—Hillary Rodham Clinton (HRC). Losing candidates’ perceptions are usually not subject to academic analyses. Nevertheless, these people often hold substantial sway in their parties and thus understanding their views on the loss is essential, especially as a party regroups after defeat. Using HRC’s memoir What Happened, we devise the Hillary Hypotheses, her rationale for her electoral defeat. Using the 2016 American National Election Study (ANES), we provide the first systematic test of a losing candidate’s rationale for their defeat. We show that more often than not, HRC’s assumptions are supported. However, we find little evidence to support HRC’s most crucial assertion, namely that the e-mail scandal and specifically James Comey’s intervention ten days before Election Day cost her the presidency. Our findings have implications for understanding why Donald Trump won, but more broadly the contribution explores an understudied aspect of elections—a defeated candidate’s impression of their loss.

scholarly journals Changes in perceptions of media bias

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 205316802098744
Author(s):  
Kirby Goidel ◽  
Nicholas T. Davis ◽  
Spencer Goidel
Keyword(s):  
Attitude Change ◽  
Media Bias ◽  
Congressional Election ◽  
Election Study ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
Change Perceptions ◽  
Individual Perceptions ◽  
2016 Election ◽  
The Media

In this paper, we utilize a module from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study to explore how individual perceptions of media bias changed over the course of the 2016 presidential campaign. While previous literature has documented the role of partisan affiliation in perceptions of bias, we know considerably less about how these perceptions change during a presidential election. Consistent with existing theories of attitude change, perceptions of bias polarize with strong Democrats moving toward believing the media were biased against Hillary Clinton (and in favor of Donald Trump) and independent-leaning Republicans moving toward believing the media were biased against Donald Trump. At the end of the 2016 election, more individuals believed the media were biased against their side. These effects were moderated by how much attention individuals paid to the campaign.

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