New York Times opinion columnist Nicholas Kristof urged liberals to find empathy with former President Trump’s supporters in a new column.
The author admitted that Democratic voters have been prone to demonize Trump voters since 2016 and advised them to relinquish that impulse so that they can build bridges with their political opposition. Kristof also said that demeaning these voters is beneath educated liberals, especially when many of Trump’s supporters are "disadvantaged, working-class Americans."
"It has also seemed to me morally offensive, particularly when well-educated and successful elites are scorning disadvantaged, working-class Americans who have been left behind economically and socially and in many cases are dying young," he wrote in the Saturday piece.
The journalist approvingly cited Bill Clinton’s speech at the Democratic National Convention where the former president told Democrats how to treat people in red states: "I urge you not to demean them, but not to pretend you don’t disagree with them if you do. Treat them with respect — just the way you’d like them to treat you."
Kristof implored his side to recognize that Trump supporters "deserve empathy, not insults."
"By all means denounce Trump, but don’t stereotype and belittle the nearly half of Americans who have sided with him," he said.
The columnist then went to describe his multiple Trump-supporting friends, characterizing their decisions to back the former president as not so irrational.
"Since I live in a rural area, many of my old friends are Trump supporters. One, a good and generous woman, backs Trump because she feels betrayed by the Democratic and Republican political establishments, and she has a point," Kristof wrote.
He explained more of her reasoning for the choice. "When factories closed and good union jobs left the area, she ended up homeless and addicted; four members of her extended family killed themselves and she once put a gun to her own head. So, when a demagogue like Trump speaks to her pain and promises to bring factories back, of course her heart leaps."
He then noted that liberals’ animosity only serves to force her to stay in Trump’s camp. Then her resolve strengthens when she hears liberals mock her faith — it was an evangelical church that helped her overcome homelessness — or deride her as ‘deplorable.’"
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He also described a woman who cuts his hair, noting she is not necessarily a Trump supporter but is struggling under the economy. "She isn’t much interested in politics and didn’t watch any of the Democratic convention; she said she distrusts Trump and sees him as a bully, but she is mad at Democrats because food prices are too high," he said.
Kristof added that it would be better if liberals sought to help her instead of berating her. "She’s a good, hardworking person who would benefit from a Democratic victory, and Democrats should fight for her — not savage her for political thought crimes."
He then admitted, "Working-class Americans have a right to feel betrayed. After almost 3,000 people died in the Sept. 11 attacks, we started two wars and allocated trillions of dollars to the response. But every three or four days we lose as many Americans to drugs, alcohol and suicide as died in the Sept. 11 attacks, yet the national response has been pathetically weak."
As a result, the "social fabric in many blue-collar communities has unraveled, and people are angry and frustrated."
He continued, noting it doesn’t help that, in recent decades, Democratic voters have caught a "whiff of condescension toward working-class voters, especially towards voters of faith."
The columnist explained the genesis of his piece: "I wasn’t planning to write this column, but then I approvingly tweeted Clinton’s comment about not demeaning those we disagree with. Plenty of readers replied hotly: But they deserve to be demeaned!"
Towards the end of the column, Kristof warned, "Sure, it’s satisfying to hurl invective. But calling people ‘Nazis’ probably won’t win over undecided voters any more than when Trump supporters deride ‘libtards’ or the ‘Biden crime family.’"
He concluded by saying, "For the sake of winning elections as well as of civility, remember that the best way to get others to listen to us is to first listen to them."
