A Wall Street Journal poll out today has some truly devastating numbers for Democrats. Not only do Republicans hold a 46-41 lead over Democrats on the question of whom voters plan to vote for this November, but Republicans now lead Democrats by 9 points among Hispanic voters, and they only trail by 35 among black voters, compared to 56 points just four months ago.
Voters believe Republicans are best able to handle almost every problem except for COVID-19, education, and healthcare. On the economy, inflation, crime, securing the border, fixing immigration, keeping children in school, handling foreign policy, and even managing the situation in Ukraine, voters trust Republicans more than Democrats.
They even beat Democrats on the question of which party best looks out for middle-class families.
As Democratic strategist Ruy Teixeira pointed out a couple of days ago, Republicans have actually been the party of the middle class for some time. “In the 2020 election, Trump carried the overall working class (noncollege) vote by 4 points, about the same margin he had in 2016,” Teixeira wrote. “The same data source also shows Republicans carrying the working class Congressional vote in three of the last four elections.”
Teixeira also noted that as much as Democrats wish it was only white working-class voters becoming Republican, that is not the case. “Since 2012, nonwhite working class voters have shifted away from the Democrats by 18 margin points, with a particularly sharp shift in the last election and particularly among Hispanics,” Teixeira wrote. “This gives Democrats’ nonchalance about their losing record among working class voters a bit of a whistling past the graveyard quality.”
Teixeira said he hopes Democrats will “rebrand themselves on cultural issues” including “crime, immigration, race, gender, schools, and language policing.” Good luck with that.
If you want to see why Republicans are making such headway with working-class votes, check out Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton’s Monday speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library:
“Ronald Reagan understood what every officeholder must remember: We are elected first and foremost to protect the American people, their prosperity, and their freedom. …
“We must show unerring resolve when protecting the livelihoods, wages, and jobs of Americans. We must rebuild an economy that works for all citizens, especially the forgotten men and women left behind by decades of open borders, unfettered trade, and globalization.
“That starts with a basic truth rejected by Democrats and, unfortunately, too many Republicans: We are a nation with an economy, not an economy with a nation. We are a people with principles, not a set of principles with a people. …
“Our party must reject the ideology of globalism, which claims that wide-open borders and wide-open markets are the path to prosperity for all. America’s shuttered factories, boarded-up main streets, and derelict drug dens stand as grim monuments that rebuke this theory. …
“For too long, cheap foreign labor, legal and illegal, has flooded our economy, driving down wages and driving many Americans out of their jobs. This has greatly enriched corporations, especially in the tech industry, at the expense of American workers and their families.
“The same warped priorities have guided our trade agenda. For decades, Washington has adopted a policy of ‘cheap goods at any price,’ as if cheap stuff could substitute for lost jobs and a dying industrial base. …
“For too long, our leaders have adopted short-term and short-sighted economic policies, selling off the inheritance of our ancestors for short-lived profit. We’ve been governed from quarter to quarter — as if America is a corporation, not a nation. This era must come to an end.”
Cultural concerns such as crime, gender, and language policing are hurting Democrats, as Teixeira says. But Democrats have also become beholden to wealthy globalist elites who benefit from free trade and high immigration that hurts working-class wages. Until Democrats can get in touch with their own populist roots on trade and immigration, Republicans will only keep adding more working-class voters.
