Kiara Henandez, Ph.D. Candidate, Taeku Lee, Bae Family Professor of Government, and Marcel Roman, Assistant Professor of Government, published an article in the Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics.
Prior research shows that the pro-Trump, anti-democratic January 6th insurrection (J6) led to a short-term reduction in Republican support for President Trump. However, it remains unclear why the anti-Trump backlash occurred among his electoral base.
We theorize that white Republicans concerned about the declining status of Anglo whites in the American ethno-racial hierarchy were the least likely to backlash against Trump after J6. Leveraging an unexpected-event-during-survey design (UESD) and a large survey fielded shortly before and after J6, we find no difference in support for Trump due to J6 among white Republicans who strongly perceived anti-white discrimination (Study 1). We replicate this result with another UESD with a separate survey fielded during J6 (Study 2) and a difference-in-differences approach with additional panel surveys fielded around J6 (Study 3). Moreover, across four cross-sectional surveys, we find the negative relationship between J6 disapproval and Trump support post-J6 between 2021 and 2024 is attenuated among status-threatened white Republicans (Studies 4–7).
Our evidence suggests racial status threat undercuts the ability of the white Republican mass public to hold co-partisan anti-democratic elites accountable for norm violations.
Read the paper here.