Understanding White Polarization in the 2016 Vote for President: The Sobering Role of Racism and Sexism

“Literature on racial priming demonstrates that racist attitudes or resentment may be the driving factor behind exposure to conservative media and affect towards Trump (Schaffner et al., 2018; Valentino, 1999).”

“Significant evidence points to race, ethnicity, and gender playing a key role in recent presidential elections, especially in 2016 (Cassese & Barnes, 2019; Jardina, 2019; Lee, 2020; Michelson & Lavariega Monforti, 2018; Schaffner et al., 2018; Wilkinson, 2018).”

“Some mayors, particularly those in White-majority cities, may know that acknowledging racial inequality is unappealing to a subset of White voters (Perry 1991; Schaffner, Macwilliams, and Nteta 2018), and may face electoral incentives to avoid recognition of racial inequality.”

“Data supports international research documenting rurality’s persistent conservatism (Lay, 2012; Oberhauser et al., 2019; Scala & Johnson, 2017; Schaffner et al., 2018; Smith & Hanley, 2018) grounded in class, sexuality and ethnicity.”

“…on gender attitudes and support for Donald Trump in Bracic, Israel-Trummel, and Shortle (2018); Cassese and Barnes (2018); Cassese and Holman (2019); Frasure-Yokley (2018); Knuckey (2018); Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta (2018); Setzler and Yanus (2018); and Valentino, Wayne, and Oceno (2018).”

“…men may be more likely to endorse sexist beliefs than women (Campbell, Schellenberg, and Senn 1997), and that those who identify with more conservative parties are more likely to be explicitly sexist than are partisans of centrist and left-leaning parties (Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018).”

“These actions were important for galvanizing Trump ’ s base of supporters (Glick et al., 2002; Schaffner et al., 2018; Sides et al., 2019; Tolbert et al., 2018).”

“…parties have very different perspectives on issues of race, which was further exacerbated during the Trump presidency that frequently featured rhetoric that activated racism and sexism (Cassese and Barnes 2019; Schaffner 2018; Schaffner, MacWilliams and Nteta 2018; Sides, Tesler and Vavreck 2018).”

“…victory, a large body of research found a significant link among White voters between voting for Trump and anti-minorities sentiments, and in particular anti-immigration sentiment (Buyuker et al., 2021; Cepuran and Berry, 2022; Jardina, 2019; Schaffner et al., 2018; Schaffner and Clark, 2017).”

“More important for this study, the inclusion of the various racial, immigration, and status variables always reduced education level to statistical non-significance (Abramowitz 2018; Hooghe and Dassonneville 2018; Mutz 2018; Schaffner et al. 2018; Setzler and Yanus 2018; Sides et al. 2018).”

“White fears of losing majority status and resentment of out-group advancement have been found to drive support for the Tea Party Movement and former President Donald Trump (Abramowitz & McCoy, 2019; Blum & Parker, 2019; Knowles et al., 2013; Mutz, 2018; Schaffner et al., 2018; Skocpol & Williamson, 2012; Tope et al.,…”

“Recent research shows a clear and independent linkage between holding sexist views and voting for and positively evaluating Donald Trump in the 2016 elections (Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018; Valentino, Wayne, and Oceno 2018; Cassese and Holman 2019).”

“Furthermore, outgroup hostility was a stronger predictor of voting for Trump than economic insecurity, education level, and other variables (Fording & Schram, 2018; Schaffner et al., 2018; 14679221 , 0 , D o w n l o a d e d fr o m h tt p s :// on li n e li b r a r y . w il e y . c o m / do i/ 10 .”

“This idea of working-class resentment at the economic failure of liberal democracy persists despite the overwhelming empirical evidence to the contrary (for refutation in aftermath of Trump 1.0 win, see Schaffner et al., 2018).”

“…has called attention to how attitudes about gender, such as modern or hostile sexism, shaped voter decision-making and behaviour in the 2016, 2018, and 2020 elections (Cassese and Barnes 2019; Oceno, Valentino, and Wayne 2023; Schaffner 2022; Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018; Utych 2021).”

“In 2016, support for Donald Trump was associated with negative racial attitudes and “hostile sexism” (Abramowitz 2018; Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018).”

“…of white southerners towards the Republican party (Valentino & Sears, 2005) and recent applications of this theory to vote switching suggest prejudicial attitudes continue to predict Republican conversion at the ballot box (Mutz, 2018; Piston, 2010; Schaffner et al., 2018; Sides et al., 2018).”

“…events in American politics have only exacerbated this divide, such as the emergence of Donald Trump as the leader of the Republican Party with his extremely conservative stances and rhetoric on issues of race and gender (Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018; Sides, Tesler, and Vavreck 2018).”

“In line with recent studies of racial attitudes and vote choice (e.g., Algara and Hale 2019, 2020; Schaffner et al. 2018), we generate a novel measure of racial attitudes that have not been used in prior studies of political participation.”

“After the election of Donald Trump as the US President, several studies have indicated that explicit (Gantt Shafer 2017) or nearly-explicit racism (Schaffner et al. 2018) became a usable mechanism for Republicans in ways that it has not been since the 1950s and 60s (Mendelberg 2001).”

“Scholars have argued that the USA is experiencing an increase in ideological polarization (Twenge, Honeycutt, Prislin, & Sherman, 2016) and that treatment of minorities poses one of the most divisive topics today (Schaffner, MacWilliams, & Nteta, 2018).”

“This aligns with recent research which shows that the public has highly polarized opinions about President Trump and his administration (e.g., Abramowitz & McCoy, 2019; Evers et al., 2019; Schaffner et al., 2018).”

“Numerous studies of the 2016 election find strong correlations between sexism and vote choice (Bock, Byrd-Craven, and Burkley 2017; Bracic, Israel-Trummel, and Shortle 2019; Knuckey 2019; Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018; Sides, Tesler, and Vavreck 2020).”

“He was overtly racist, sexist, and xenophobic on the campaign trail and in office, which actually won him support (see for example Jardina and Traugott 2019; Schaffner et al. 2018; Jardina 2019).”

“2019) and through the use of racist and bigoted language, Trump amassed a wave of popular support that resulted in his winning the 2016 presidential election (Schaffner et al. 2018) and was poised to earn reelection in 2020 (Devega 2019).”

“Respondents high in ambivalent sexism were more likely to vote for Donald Trump and less likely to have voted for Hilary Clinton (Bracic, Israel-Trummel, and Shortle 2019; Cassese and Holman 2018; Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018; Valentino, Wayne, and Oceno 2018).”

“Additional research using a four-factor “hostile sexism” score (Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018) to measure sex-based attitudes among 2016 likely voters finds that voters with the largest hostile sexism scores had a probability of voting for Donald Trump of 0.66 compared to a 0.34…”

“In addition, racial bias is a strong predictor of Trump support [55], and similar far-right leaders may also exploit racial animus to weaken the social safety net in other nations facing ongoing immigration crises [56].”

“4 In 2016, Trump’s language around “special treatment” for marginalized groups (Jardina, 2019; Mutz, 2018) drew upon sexist and racist beliefs among some of the public (Schaffner et al., 2018; Sides et al., 2018).”

“…role (Bock, Byrd-Craven, and Burkley 2017; Cassese and Barnes 2019; Cassese and Holman 2016; Frasure-Yokley 2018; Godbole, Malvar, and Valian 2019; Knuckey 2019; Ratli ff et al. 2019; Scha ff ner 2022a; Scha ff ner, MacWilliams, and Nteta 2018; Valentino, Wayne, and Oceno 2018; Winter 2023).”

“For test–retest reliability, results are shown in Table 4 and were comparable to longitudinal correlations for other personality”

“For example, White women overwhelming voted for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election (CNN, 2018) despite his history of sexism (Boyer, 2017; Cohen, 2017); the majority of which were motivated by racism and sexism rather than economic difficulties (Schaffner et al., 2018).”

“Most empirical studies [10, 20, 24, 25] in this line of research conclude that it was these factors, not economic conditions, that principally explain voter choice in 2016.”

“Email: lapoe@ohio.edu The 2018 midterm elections saw the most diverse House of Representatives elected, based on race, gender, religion, sexual orientation and political diversity (Schaffner et al., 2018).”

“Concomitantly, racist and sexist voters over-whelmingly supported Trump in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections (Hooghe and Dassonneville 2018; Piazza and Van Doren 2023; Schaffner et al. 2018).”

“…Trump supporters disproportionately endorse ethnocentric attitudes about identity and status, especially regarding race and immigration (Hopkins and Washington 2020; Mutz 2018b; Reny, Collingwood, and Valenzuela 2019; Schaffner, Macwilliams, and Nteta 2018; Sides, Tesler, and Vavreck 2019).”

“10 In one notable example, Bill Clinton teamed with the Republican Congress to end the welfare entitlement.”

“Most of this scholarship is from the USA, showing associations between hostile sexism and support for Donald Trump in 2016 (Cassese and Barnes 2019; Schaffner et al. 2018); antipathy towards female congressional candidates in 2016 (Winter, 2023); endorsement of Republican House candidates in the…”