Deepening Diploma Divide

In Defying the Odds, we talk about the social and economic divides that enabled Trump to enter the White House. In Divided We Stand, we discuss how these divides played out in 2020.  

Nate Moore at The Liberal Patriot:

We are on track for a historically large education divide among white voters. An average of recent polls finds Joe Biden winning white college-educated voters by 18 points and losing white non-college voters by 27 points—a colossal gap of 45 points. 

Compared to 2020 results, Trump’s margin with non-college whites is holding steady, while Biden has significantly improved his standing with degree-holding whites. Such Democratic improvement is certainly welcome for Team Biden, but not unexpected. College-educated white voters have been shifting blue for a decade, driven left by Trump and the GOP’s hardline cultural stances. The flip side of the demographic coin is that nonwhite voters, particularly those without a degree, are moving towards Republicans. Should current trends continue, education polarization—rather than racial—will become the defining feature of American elections. 

 

Trump v. DeSantis: Very Nasty, Very Early

Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  The early stages of the 2024 race have begun.

David Knowles at Yahoo:

Former President Donald Trump escalated his attacks on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis Tuesday, seizing on a story that his rival for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination partied with underage students when he worked as a teacher at a Georgia high school.

In five successive posts Tuesday to his social media site, Truth Social, Trump went after DeSantis. Two of them referenced a story published by the far-right website Hillreporter.com that claimed DeSantis had been photographed "partying with underaged students" at the Darlington School, a private K-12 school in Rome, Ga., where DeSantis taught from 2001-02.

Trump reposted a photograph originally posted by a Truth Social member who goes by the handle Dong-Chan Lee, and who uses a profile photo of the alt-right meme Pepe the Frog, featuring Trump's signature hairdo. The image showed what appeared to be DeSantis flanked by three young women that had been captioned, "Here is Ron DeSanctimonious grooming high school girls with alcohol as a teacher."