Boiled down, Trump’s appeal to the Republican Party’s base consists of his willingness to say nakedly racist statements and his promises to enact equally racist legislation. But why is that appeal surprising? In its contemporary manifestation, the GOP has repeatedly sought the support of voters who wish to disempower and intimidate racial minorities. This isn’t just about the party’s bizarre obsession with upholding the sanctity of the Confederate flag. To this day, for example, the party continues to advocate for Voter ID laws, which are ostensibly designed to combat in-person voter fraud—a virtually non-existent phenomenon—but in practice help prevent a disproportionate number of eligible non-white voters from actually voting. Its intellectual leaders have dismissed the ubiquitous threat of police violence towards black people as illusory.
Donald Trump’s popularity indicates that this country’s most fervent conservatives are primarily concerned not with reducing abortion rights, or repealing Obamacare, but rather with preserving white hegemony in the United States. For years and years, the Republican Party has happily accommodated these kinds of conservatives under the unspoken assumption that they would never be powerful enough to publicize their own candidate. Trump speaks to the error of that assumption.
). That's a big leap though from their current jobs. She might take a hard core liberal instead like a Sherrod Brown from Ohio...
