Primary voters most likely to say they're bothered by Biden being a white man in his 70s are ... white Democrats

This reminds me of the progressive poll last fall showing that 98 percent of Latinos, when asked how they label themselves racially or ethnically, chose something other than the trendily woke-ish “Latinx.” “Latinx” isn’t a term normal people use. It’s a term used by political activists, the sort of people who lay awake at night troubled by the gendering inherent in the terms “Latino” and “Latina.”

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That sort of person spends a lot of time online. And they tend to be very, very white.

Pew’s latest finds another case of white liberals out-woking their minority counterparts:

Young Democrats from ages 18 to 29 are also more likely to say they’re bothered by the fact that Biden’s an old white guy than other age groups, as are highly educated lefties with postgrad degrees. But the racial divide is a standout. It makes me think of this op-ed from last year measuring ways that white Democrats are more progressive on racial questions than black Democrats are. For example, asked to rate how positive their feelings are about their own race versus other races, black Clinton voters split 85/59. White Clinton voters split 70/80 — i.e. they felt more positive about other races than their own. They were also far more likely than black Americans generally were to say that diversity made America a better place. And white Democrats were more likely than black Democrats to say they want to see immigration increased. That’s not all:

The Hidden Tribes study from the More in Common organization — which groups the American electorate on the basis of its views — helps identify the leading proponents of racial liberalism: Of the seven major voting blocs, the most racially liberal are the Progressive Activists, who form just 8 percent of the population. This group is over 80 percent white and only 3 percent African-American. Similarly, a Pew Research Center report finds that the “Solid Liberals” group is overwhelmingly white, and that minority Democrats are more conservative.

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In the case of Biden, it may be that white Dems and black Dems are grading him in slightly different ways. To a white Democrat, having an old white guy on top of the ticket may seem regressive no matter who it is. Biden fails the diversity test in its crudest form. To a black Democrat, it may be that an old white guy is more acceptable if he happens to be the loyal former VP to the first black president. That is, it may be black liberals more so than white ones who are more likely to believe not all white people are equally “problematic,” to borrow one of the left’s choicer terms.

Here’s my favorite part of the Pew poll. Democrats who say they’re bothered by Biden’s old-white-maleness are more likely to vote for him over Trump than Democrats who are unbothered:

It makes sense in a way. The wokest Democrats are also the Democrats who are most likely to detest Trump. Whatever objections they have to Biden are overwhelmed by their objections to the president. But intuitively it’s odd that someone *less* bothered by Grandpa Joe is also *less* likely to vote for him.

Either way, notes Tiana Lowe, that’s a mighty small contingent of anti-Biden voters. During the 2016 election, some 15 percent of Bernie voters said they wouldn’t support Clinton over Trump. Biden looks like he’ll have a more unified party than that this fall, which is a big deal in swing states.

Relatedly, there’s another demographic group with enormous influence in November whom Trump should keep an eye on. Josh Kraushaar’s been following Trump’s support among senior citizens, normally a reliable pro-GOP contingent. Not lately, though:

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The latest Morning Consult poll found that 65-and-older voters prioritized defeating the coronavirus over healing the economy by nearly a 6-to-1 ratio. And over the past month, they’ve become the group most disenchanted with Trump’s handling of the crisis. In mid-March, seniors were more supportive of Trump than any other age group (plus-19 net approval). Now, their net approval of the president has dropped 20 points and is lower than any age group outside of the youngest Americans.

Those findings were matched by a new NBC/WSJ poll, which tested the presidential matchup between Trump and Joe Biden. Among seniors 65 and older, Biden led Trump by 9 points, 52 to 43 percent. That’s a dramatic 16-point swing from Hillary Clinton’s showing in the 2016 election; she lost seniors by 7 points to Trump (52-45 percent).

That’s a disaster in the making for the president. The trend’s not all due to coronavirus, I bet: Biden performed well with senior citizens throughout the primary and would be a threat to Trump within that group even in normal times. But since seniors are the group most at risk from the COVID epidemic, it stands to reason that they might have special cause to hold a grudge over how the White House mismanaged the earliest phase of containment. Given that seniors famously turn out to vote at high rates, if Trump can’t do something to erase Biden’s advantage among them in the next six months he’s cooked. That’s something to think about the next time he’s tempted to push the “reopen now!” message or retweet a clip of someone on Fox suggesting that we’re just going to have to accept a certain frightful number of deaths in order to get back to business. Seniors know which group those deaths are mostly going to come from. A 75-year-old at a MAGA rally might be willing to fall on his sword to revive the Trump economy but most people that age will not.

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Via the Free Beacon, here’s perpetual Biden VP auditioner Stacey Abrams being told by Gayle King that she’s “extremely qualified” to be vice president. She’s 46 and has never held federal or statewide office. What?

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