Discomfort with “the other” fuels “fear of cultural displacement” among white working-class voters, according to a 2015 study by the Atlantic and the Public Religion Research Institute. “White working-class voters who say they often feel like a stranger in their own land and who believe the U.S. needs protecting against foreign influence were 3.5 times more likely to favor Trump than those who did not share these concerns,” according to the study.
Among Trump supporters, many of whom reject the notion of hyphenated identifiers, hearing Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton repeatedly discuss how the experiences of black Americans, immigrants and other racial minorities differed from white Americans was off-putting — especially among the more than half of white working-class Americans who believe discrimination against whites has become as much of a problem as discrimination against racial minorities.
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