Who Are the Trump Supporters and Why Will They Never Waver?
Why do people still support this controversial president?
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I have struggled long and hard to understand how many Americans continue their unwavering support for a president whose administration has constantly lied to the American people and has failed miserably at handling a global pandemic.
Some of the bizarre things we have witnessed from Trump include:
- He downplayed a virus that has caused the deaths of 200,000 Americans. There is audio of him admitting it if you need proof.
- He lies so often he requires constant fact checks.
- He began his very first day lying about his inauguration crowds and edited images to make the crowds appear larger.
- He used a sharpie to change the appearance of the course of a hurricane on a weather map.
- He has been accused of sexual misconduct from 26 women.
- He called a group of white supremacists, “very fine people.”.
- He’s called for a third term of his presidency.
- He has suggested that people should inject bleach in their veins.
- He was impeached by the House of Representatives for abuse of power and obstruction.
- He had peaceful protestors tear-gassed to make way for a photo-op where he awkwardly held a bible upside down in front of a closed church that he doesn’t attend.
- He holds political rallies with such disregard for public health that they have been described as “super spreader events.”
How can his approval rating stay pretty much the same?
Why does a man that has done all of these things, and many more, maintain around the same approval rating today as he did when he first entered office? According to the Gallup poll, Trump’s latest approval rating is at 42%. It’s been as low as 35% but usually averages around 40%.
Who makes up this steady 40% approval rating? And why does nothing he does seem to change their minds?
The wealthy
There are the ones that don’t care one way or the other about Trump’s moral compass. These people will vote for him because of the benefits they think he will bring them. These are wealthy people that want to keep their taxes low.
They are the 1%. They are business owners that don’t want government regulations impeding how they conduct business. Trump has done away with many regulations, such as environmental protection and banking regulations.
They are also the people that mistakenly believe that a Republican president means a better stock market. It doesn’t.
The pro-lifers
These people care about one issue and one issue only. They want conservative judges appointed to the Supreme Court. They will overlook everything else to get to chance at overturning Roe v. Wade.
Although Trump was firmly pro-choice in the 90s, he is a staunch supporter of pro-life now.
He is the first president ever to attend a March for Life event. Four more years of Trump means four more years of conservative right-wing judge appointments filling up the courts. And it almost certainly means the overturning of Roe v. Wade and the loss of reproductive freedom for women.
The climate change deniers
Big businesses benefit from relaxed environmental protection laws. And then there are those that don’t believe the consensus of scientists that tell us climate change is not only real, but it’s here now.
With a wild hurricane season where we ran out of names to the raging wildfires in the West, it’s clear, climate change is no longer some far off possibility. It’s here and it’s happening. But many people still don’t believe it.
And what did Trump have to say about the devastating wildfires? “It’ll start getting cooler. You just watch.”
This is reminiscent of his original words on the coronavirus. Remember these words back in January? “We have very little problem in this country at this moment.”
The conspiracy theorists
These are the ones that think the coronavirus is a liberal plot designed to make Trump look bad. Never mind that it makes no sense that the entire world would be involved in a global conspiracy for the benefit of American politics.
As egocentric as Americans tend to be, it’s far fetched even for us to believe that there is a global effort to remove Trump from office. Yet, I have heard Trump supporters state that the coronavirus will magically disappear after the election.
No, these people aren’t interested in the truth. They think masks are bad, the virus is nothing more than a cold, and the rest of us are all sheep for believing any of it.
And then there are the bizarre conspiracy theories that come from the growing source of QAnon. These conspiracy theories are based on the belief that liberals are running a pedophile ring of child slavery.
And it has something to do with Wayfair. I’m unclear on the details. What I am clear on is that it’s all very strange and far too many people believe it.
The conspiracy theorists don’t get their news from newspapers. They believe the liberal elite has taken over the news media. They don’t trust respected news sources that are upheld by strict standards.
They prefer to get their information straight from Trump’s mouth, or from random Youtube videos circulating the internet.
The fear of socialism
Trump routinely announces at his rallies that Joe Biden and the liberal Democrats are going to destroy America as we know it with their socialist agenda.
These people are confusing social democracy with socialism. True socialism, the kind that the Republicans are railing against, means nationalizing manufacturing and removing private property.
Nobody is looking for that. Democrats are not calling for an authoritarian government of the kind that is often associated with socialism.
Social democracy, however, means things like universal healthcare and possibly free college. The CARES Act that provided relief to businesses suffering during the pandemic is a form of socialism. So are road repairs, schools, and public libraries.
The fear that Democrats’ ultimate agenda is to strip Americans of their freedoms is palpable when you interact with these Trump supporters.
I know this firsthand as I recently became embroiled in a Facebook discussion with a distant relative and her conservative friends.
They are certain if Biden wins it will be the last time America ever gets to vote, as we will immediately be pushed into a socialist nation with no rights and no property.
It doesn’t matter that there is no evidence to support any of these fears. They have them, and they aren’t going away. And they think Trump is their only hope.
The fear of immigrants
Build the wall is the common refrain we all heard from Trump’s 2016 election. The people chanting it are truly afraid that a steady stream of immigrants from Mexico are ready to march into America, steal jobs, use up our healthcare resources, and commit crimes as they’re doing it. It doesn’t matter that no evidence suggests immigration is correlated with higher crime.
It doesn’t matter that Trump’s trial version of the wall he had built is already eroding. Or that there is no evidence that a wall if it ever gets built, will even keep out illegal immigrants.
Truly, it’s the immigrants that should be afraid, as the Trump administration policies have created deplorable conditions in southern border camps.
But the idea of a wall makes these Trump supporters feel safer, and they won’t be changing their minds.
These groups of Trump supporters are not all-inclusive. One person can belong to more than one of these groups.
However, there is an underlying pattern among them. It all seems to be related to selfishness and inward concerns. They either support Trump for financial gain or support him due to their fears of the unknown.
Their support remains constant. The question now becomes, who else will come out to vote, and will it be enough to make a difference.
