Win or Lose, Trump Has Turned the Tide of the Culture Wars
Donald Trump won his surprise victory in the 2016 presidential election, he brought with him what political scientists call a "thermostatic backlash" in the culture, a phenomenon in which public opinion shifts in the opposite direction following significant policy changes or other seismic political events.Before the pandemic accelerated things, Trump's first term in office was defined by cultural backlashes like the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements, and a renewed focus within elite institutions on social justice, racial and gender issues.In his last year in office, spurred by the arrival of Covid-19 and the murder of George Floyd weeks later, the country convulsed under intersecting debates about personal freedoms, racism and public health.
In cities across the country, there were demands to "defund the police," yards signs proclaiming "no human is illegal" and "science is real."Fast forward four years, and Democrats are running a tough-on-crime former prosecutor pledging to crack down on illegal immigration in a campaign that has barely mentioned classic liberal social issues like the death penalty, climate change or gun control.
In fact, both candidates on the Democratic ticket have found time to boast about their gun ownership.The man most singularly responsible for the that pivot is none other than Donald Trump.Four years ago, the conventional wisdom in Washington was that Joe Biden's win represented a repudiation of Trump and his influence on the GOP.
And yet, Trump and his MAGA movement are once again a coin flip away from a triumphant return to power."America is very polarized, and much of our political discourse has culture war undertones," said Andrew Hartman, author of A War for the Soul of America: A History of the Culture Wars, in an interview with Newsweek."This isn't just about specific issues; it's about a zero-sum view of national identity, often framed as an existential battle."Hartman said Trump's been able to intensify those cultural.
