Election 2020: It’s the identity, stupid

Stephen H. Provost is the author of more than 20 books and a former journalist at four daily newspapers in California. His books “Political Psychosis” and “Media Meltdown in the Age of Trump” examine the Trump presidency.

After the end of the Gulf War in early 1991, President George H.W. Bush’s approval rating had skyrocketed to 89%. But 18 months later, a listless economy had driven that rating down 60 points to 29%.

Bill Clinton rode that economic slump to victory in the 1992 election.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out what happened. As Clinton strategist James Carville put it, “It’s the economy, stupid.”

Anyone with half a brain knew that a bad economy would sink a presidency.

Flash forward to 2020, when we’ve lost that half of our brain. The economy is in terrible shape, businesses have closed, jobs have been lost... and yet, incumbent Donald Trump enjoys steady support of somewhere between 39% and 45% of the public. That’s not high, but it’s never been high — even when the economy was good. But it’s also not as low as H.W. Bush’s got.

Something’s clearly different now, and the simplest answer is the most obvious: People no longer care how well a president does his job, even on the most fundamental of issues, the economy. It’s not about health care, his response to disasters such as hurricanes or California wildfires, not his corruption, not foreign policy. If the economy doesn’t move the needle, none of those things will.

It’s easy to say, “That couldn’t possibly be true.”

But the numbers don’t lie.

The greatest impact the economy has had on Trump’s approval wasn’t during the coronavirus pandemic, but during the period leading up to the government shutdown of 2018. Even then, his approval rating never dropped below 35%.

If issues aren’t decisive, though, what is?

What factor is powerful enough to get people to stop caring about how well a president performs, even on the economy?

It’s the identity, stupid.

Identity politics

It’s the height of irony that Donald Trump, who has railed against the evils of “identity politics,” has mastered them so completely. He’s tapped into fear among certain segments of the population that they’re losing their identity as the dominant force in these United States.

The epicenter of this group consists of white, evangelical men in blue-collar families, and it radiates out from there to include white evangelical women in blue-collar families, white evangelicals generally, and white men generally.

Is there identity politics on the other side? Absolutely. But its diversity renders it far less homogenous and monolithic, embracing a broad coalition of women; college-educated men; and ethnic, religious, and LGBTQIA minorities.

The former group has reinforced its solidarity with by identifying with the Republican label generally, and Trump more specifically. The latter groups have coalesced more concretely than before around the Democrat label, amid the decline of third-party candidates.

Voters who don’t formally align with either party — and consider themselves independent — still exist, but they’re more likely to support one or the other consistently than before.

As an example, take Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats. After his failed 2016 run for the White House, his support for the Democrats’ nominee, Hillary Clinton, was less enthusiastic than his support for this year’s nominee, Joe Biden. Sanders has said this is because he’s got a better relationship with Biden. But he’s also said the stakes are higher this time around.

That’s the sense on both sides: Each believes its vision of what America should be is at stake. And because they identify so closely with their competing visions, they view the election as a battle for survival. That’s what happens when you use something external to define yourself — whether it’s a group or a person. You see any attack on that external thing (or person) as personal attack on YOU.

This is precisely why I continue to call myself an independent: I don’t want to forfeit my identity, and my right to think for myself, to any group or person, no matter how frequently or passionately I may agree with their views. I want my decisions to be based on freedom of thought, not the shackles of false identity.

Process of decay

The drift toward identity politics didn’t begin with Donald Trump, though he has both exploited and accelerated the process.

Back in 2012, Republican nominee Mitt Romney dismissed the famed “47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what.” Four years later, Hillary Clinton labeled half of Trump’s supporters a “basket of deplorables.” Both statements were seen as huge gaffes because they labeled millions of people as irrelevant. It was like saying, “These people don’t matter. They don’t count. They might as well not exist.”

But those gaffes have become undeclared policy for both sides — which is not to say that both sides are equally responsible.

Biden, to his credit, is attempting to disavow this approach. But Trump has embraced and emphasized it, knowing it gives him a tactical advantage. Why? Because divisiveness doesn’t need to be a two-way street. If one side is intent upon stoking division, it puts the other side in a no-win situation: It can either do nothing and accept the division or fight back and increase it. It takes two to tango.

The more Trump has encouraged his supporters to identify themselves — and their vision for America —with him personally, the more the invested they’ve become in the illusion of himself that he’s created. And the more fearful they’ve grown of what will happen if the symbol of everything they believe in... loses. The other side has grown equally fearful that, if they lose, the divisiveness will not only continue but reach the point where the entire system collapses.

And here’s the thing: Both sides are probably right. If the Democrats’ vision for the nation carries the day, a nation defined by white, blue-collar, evangelical, male values will become a thing of the past. If Trump’s vision for the United States prevails, a system built on democratic ideals and mutual respect will collapse under the weight of corruption and division.

Health care won’t matter. Pandemics won’t matter. Natural disasters won’t matter. The economy won’t matter. People’s lives won’t matter.

The only thing that will matter is identity politics and the fragile psyches that support it. The only thing that will matter is stopping the other side. In such a conflict, any victory is bound to be an empty one — devoid of any principle beyond hatred, of any reward beyond more fear.

That’s what’s defining the election. Oh, for the days when the economy actually mattered.