Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

letters to the editor:

Trump remains divisive to the bitter end

On the eve of the third presidential debate — a scant three weeks from the 2016 election — I’m not sure if the world or the political establishment has come to terms with the “Trump phenomenon.” Because of Donald Trump, this has been one of the strangest and most divisive election campaigns in U.S. history.

Numerous academics have tied Trump’s success to socioeconomic trends that have produced a disaffected group of predominately non-university-educated white males whose standards of living, job security, pensions, home values and other investments have languished or been put at risk by the Great Recession (and the two decades of automation and globalization that preceded it). Recent demographic changes, i.e. the “browning of America,” as well as sociopolitical changes that have given blacks, gays and lesbians, and women greater voices, civil rights and power also have made many in this disaffected group uneasy. Trump’s bombastic rhetoric, which is laced with racism, misogyny and xenophobia, plays well to this group.

Although some pundits argued that Trump might “pivot” to a more traditional, less polemic, issues-oriented campaign, the appointments of Stephen Bannon, formerly of the ultra-conservative Breitbart News, as his campaign CEO, and Roger Ailes, formerly of Fox News and the recognized author of many “white identity” issues, as a debate adviser indicated that the Trump campaign intended to double down on his divisive rhetoric.