The Politics of Losing: Trump, the Klan, and the Mainstreaming of Resentment

In this measured analysis of how Donald Trump became U.S. president, social studies professors McVeigh (The Rise of the Ku Klux Klan) and Estep compare the sociopolitical conditions of the 1920s and the early 2000s to examine conditions that foment white nationalist movements. Like the Klan of the 1920s, the authors argue, Trump managed to link “the economic grievances of millions of white middle-class Americans to racial, ethnic, and religious resentments.” The core of this study is a county-level statistical analysis of factors influencing Trump’s performance in the 2016 primaries and general election. This is paired with a comparison of Klan materials and Trump’s speeches and tweets, highlighting eerie similarities between their rhetorical appeals to white Americans, often regarding supposedly dangerous “foreign elements” and putative corruption in mainstream politics. By attacking the mainstream press and enclosing supporters in a cocoon of favorable information, Trump and the Klan provided targets for resentment to white Americans who had lost political and economic standing due to changing voter demographics and economic hardship. McVeigh and Estep keep their study accessible, confining the regression analyses to one chapter and an appendix. Their carefully plotted argument persuasively concludes that segregation, rather than pure prejudice, allows white nationalism to flourish. Erudite and surprisingly evenhanded, this study makes a substantial contribution to understanding an increasingly polarized country. (Jan.)