People of Color
"People of Color" is a category error.
Democrats need to wise up about identity politics or they will put Trump back into office.
Democrats hope to form an electoral majority with a coalition of people who feel aggrieved over having gotten a raw deal. Groups that are targets of prejudice are part of the coalition: Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Jews, Muslims, women. Every one of them has a legitimate raw deal.
GOP opposition helped define Democrats in a way that preserved the White working class as part of that coalition. The party of Goldwater, Reagan and Romney was a libertarian pro-business party. It was the party of the Chamber of Commerce. GOP messaging said that trickle down would work if taxes on the richest were low enough. It said that regulations protecting workers or the environment were burdensome. The GOP opposed labor unions. They opposed raising the minimum wage. The GOP message kept the White working class on board with Democrats.
The Democratic coalition is falling apart. Frustrations over COVID, the optics on Afghanistan, and Biden's inability to cheerlead our economy are setting up Democrats to lose big in 2022 and 2024. Democrats cannot count on Republicans self-destructing by keeping as party leader an unhinged Trump. Trump might continue to insist the election was stolen and praise insurrection rioters as patriots andstillmight not lose.
Led by thought leaders in nonprofits and universities and the elite media, Democrats have concluded that identity is destiny. They concluded Martin Luther King's dream, that his children should be judged by the content of their character not the color of their skin was naive and wrong. King's dream was an aspiration. Most Americans acknowledge racism, but their aspiration is a better future of equal opportunity. Democratic thought leaders may think they are realists doing the work of racial justice. They are counterproductive. They are understood as pessimists, as racists themselves, and as oppressive accusers. It is a loser of a message.
In perceiving identity-oppression as central, Democrats are slow to respond to the reality that too many of their supposed beneficiaries disagree. The college admissions lawsuits make clear that the interests of ambitious Asian immigrants is very different from the interests of native-born Blacks. They aren't team-mates. The erosion of votes in predominately Hispanic counties in Texas demonstrate Hispanic team identity is an illusion. Cubans aren't Mexicans aren't Puerto Ricans. Hispanics aren't bonded by common interests. Citizen Hispanics have different interests than newcomers.
Native-born Black Americans have a powerful shaping experiences and memories: Slavery, segregation, back-of-the-bus stigmatization, mortgage red lining, and "driving while Black." Immigrants to America, including ones with dark skin, have a different experience and orientation. America represents opportunity for them. Their glass is half full. They expect hard work and achievements to be rewarded, not resented or confiscated. Immigrant success does not upset the social order.
Democrats are getting the worst of both worlds. Their focus on identity and oppression is failing to unify their coalition because their coalition is not unified. Identity politics does serve to unify opposition. White Americans have heard the message that they are the bad guys.
I expect 2022 to be a disaster for Democrats. It is too late to change their message and leadership. It likely will embolden Trump. Trump may frighten Republicans into even tighter conformity with him, and therefore frighten 2024 voters back into the arms of anyone-but-Trump. Democrats could win by losing.
There is a better future for Democrats, though, than being the party that survives by not being Trump. That would be a Democratic candidate in an open primary who pushes reset by openly saying he or she disagrees with the identity notion of Democrats and substitutes an optimistic opportunity message. Such a candidate does not need to create something brand new. It could be a return to the politics of aspiration. It would say that Martin Luther King was right. Race and identity are not central. Equality and economic opportunity are.
Such a spokesperson will hurt some feelings. Democratic thought leaders want desperately to believe that Blacks, Asians, Jews, LGBTQ, Hispanics, women, and every other group wants diversity, inclusion, and equity. There is something condescending and glass-half-empty about particularizing victimhood and doing overt government action to adjust for equity. I suspect that voters desire a different message. If Democrats don't offer it, a Republican will. Black South Carolina Democrats pointed the way. A majority of people in those groups want to be treated like free, capable Americans. That is their identity.
A Democrat could win with that message.