Is Trump A Racist?

Prominent Democrats are now accusing President Trump of being a racist for championing the bringing of higher educated, more skilled immigrants to America, and voters tend to believe they’re right. 

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 50% of Likely U.S. Voters believe the president is a racist. Forty-three percent (43%) disagree and say his opponents are accusing him of racism for political gain. (To see survey question wording, click here.)  

 As is generally the case in surveys involving Trump, there’s a sharp political difference of opinion. While 79% of Democrats think the president is a racist, 73% of Republicans say his opponents are just playing politics. Voters not affiliated with either major political party are evenly divided. 

Separate surveying finds that 72% of all voters believe most politicians raise racial issues just to get elected. Only 13% think they raise these issues to address real problems.

Eighty percent (80%) of Americans believe the term “racism” refers to any discrimination by people of one race against another. Just 11% think racism is specifically discrimination by white people against minorities. 

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The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on January 16-17, 2018 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology. 

Lost in the debate over whether the president used obscene language in a private discussion of legal immigration is the issue he was addressing: Why isn’t the United States admitting higher skilled, better-educated immigrants? Maybe it’s because voters themselves are conflicted. 

Seventy-five percent (75%) of blacks and 51% of other minority voters believe Trump is a racist. Among whites, 45% agree, but slightly more (49%) disagree.

Women are more likely than men to believe the president is a racist. The older the voter, the more likely he or she is to think his opponents are accusing him of racism for political gain.

Higher-income voters are less likely than those who earn less to consider the president a racist. Government employees feel that way more strongly than entrepreneurs and those who work in the private sector do.

Ninety-four percent (94%) of voters who Strongly Disapprove of the job the president is doing think he is a racist. Among those who Strongly Approve of Trump’s job performance, just as many (94%) believe instead that his opponents are accusing him of racism for political gain.

Just 22% of all Americans think race relations are getting better in this country. Twice as many (45%) say they’re getting worse.

Interestingly, however, in July 2016, as Barack Obama’s presidency came to a close, 60% of voters said race relations had gotten worse since the start of his time in the White House. Obama was the first black president.

As recently as three years ago, 20% of whites, 30% of blacks and 35% of other minority adults believed most Americans were racist. 

Democrats are threatening to force a federal government shutdown unless Congress does something to protect the nearly 800,000 illegal immigrants who came to this country as children who now face possible deportation. But most voters oppose a government shutdown over the so-called Dreamers issue and believe securing the border is a bigger priority.

Additional information from this survey and a full demographic breakdown are available to Platinum Members only.

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