Ross Perot showed us the hidden populist voter

After Republicans lost in 2012, failing to retake the White House and actually losing Senate seats despite a sagging Obama-era economy, two prominent analyses were proposed.

One — the Republican National Committee’s “autopsy” — said the GOP’s problem was embracing social issues too much and liberal immigration too little. The other analysis — the “Missing White Voter” thesis — was grounded in actual data. It said the problem was that the GOP of the Bush family and Mitt Romney had turned off working-class whites to the point that they disengaged.