Even after the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, 60 percent of Republican and Republican-leaning voters still approved of Donald Trump’s performance as president. Though this level of popular support baffles many Americans, it follows in the tails of an approval rating that—while generally hovering around a modest 40 percent—remained remarkably steady throughout Trump’s blunderous presidency and near-constant assault on democratic norms and institutions.
Knee-jerk Beltway attempts to explain away this loyal adherence tend to revert to suggestions that Trump supporters are uneducated or impoverished or both—mostly angry at being “left behind” by the new economy. Now, after a mob of Trump supporters quite literally laid siege to U.S. democracy, it’s clear that there are more significant and enduring factors at play. Growing evidence suggests that Trumpism—and right-wing populist movements like it—must prompt a serious reckoning with vulnerabilities not just within the U.S. political system but within liberal democracy more generally.
