It’s fairly easy to identify the fundamentally racist appeal of Donald Trump — and disparage his supporters as being biased, whether or not they admit it to others (or even themselves). Well, a Reuters/Ipsos poll released late Tuesday suggests there’s truth in that assessment, but Democrats have no reason to feel smug.
The survey of 16,000 Americans found nearly one-half of Trump supporters described blacks as more “violent” and more “criminal” than whites. But so did nearly one-third of Hillary Clinton supporters. Racism is not limited to one political party.
Those results are consistent with the conclusions of much recent research. As we reported in February, a study has found that “faces of five-year-old black boys are sufficient to trigger whites into heightened-threat mode.”
And let’s not fool ourselves into believing members of the younger generation are less racist than their parents. A study we reported on exactly one year ago found “slightly more likely than white members of Generation X to think that blacks are less intelligent than whites.”
