LATINOS

Geraldo Cadava, New Yorker -  It is beyond doubt that Trumpism is infused with white supremacy, and that this is part of its appeal to some Latinos. With people such as Stephen Miller in Trump’s inner circle, his Administration is likely to do what it can to reverse the tide of demographic change, in part through mass deportations. But shifting attention from the thing that voters themselves said motivated them, to something more insidious, is as wrong as it is perilous. It is absolutely possible for Latinos to understand racism and still vote for a racist candidate whom they think, rightly or wrongly, will help them prosper. Moreover, bluntly asserting that Trump’s Latino supporters misdiagnosed the root cause of their struggles and that they are, in fact, racist and sexist isn’t the way to begin a conversation that could lead them to vote for Democrats going forward. More concretely, it also defies logic that a fourteen-percentage-point shift in four years can be attributed to the racism Latinos hold within themselves. All of a sudden, we’re supposed to believe that the new Latino Trump voters decided that they’re white, anti-immigrant, and trans- and homophobic?