Opinion: Five reasons Americans voted for Trump despite his character flaws

Is American democracy alive and well or on life support following Donald Trump’s latest win, asks Paul Williams.

Donald Trump on election night with wife Melania. Picture: Jim WATSON/AFP

Watching Donald Trump achieve the impossible and win a second term as US president offers two conclusions as to the health of American democracy.

One is that US democracy is alive and well. Despite Trump’s odious record – everything from his pathological lying and behaviour towards women to his gutter rhetoric and encouragement of insurrectionists on January 6, 2021 – a majority of Americans (Trump looks like winning the popular vote too) made a free and conscious choice to elect him and not the amiable Kamala Harris.

Like it or not, Americans must respect that choice.

This election, like that in 2020, appears fair and uncorrupted, and you won’t see Harris or her supporters scream “cheat” like a petulant child losing a game of Monopoly, as Trump has done for four long years.

But a second view is that American democracy is either dead or on life support.

With so many voters no longer engaging with traditional news media – instead receiving propaganda from social media and extremist sites – and with a majority of Americans openly embracing a hate-filled authoritarian whose own former staff describe him as fascist, it’s self-evident US democracy in 2028 will in no way resemble that of 2008.

So why did Americans, now well aware of Trump’s appalling character, still endorse him? There are five likely reasons.

The first is the American economy – or, more accurately, how voters perceive it.

Despite US inflation dropping to just 3.4 per cent, voters feel worse off than they did in 2020, with most believing America was heading in the wrong economic direction.

Trump, of course, will get credit for an economy improved by Joe Biden’s fiscal restraint.

Interestingly, according to “retrospective voting” theory, voters remember recent economic pain (US inflation was 7 per cent in 2021) more easily than economic joy.

This is borne out by exit polls that showed the economy was the most critical issue for 51 per cent of Trump voters, but important to just 13 per cent of Harris supporters.

Second, illegal immigration still looms large, with 20 per cent of Republicans rating it as the most important issue, compared with just 2 per cent of Democrats.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton is unlikely to go full Trump. Picture: Martin Ollman/NCA NewsWire

The very thought of deporting millions of immigrants satisfies so many angry working-class Americans.

Third, there has long been an authoritarian thread growing across American politics.

Designed by the founding fathers to be a libertarian republic resisting all forms of control, the US in recent decades has come to worship the shouty authoritarian even it means sacrificing the rule of law.

In fact, many deny the US is a democracy at all, instead describing it as a constitutional republic, despite Trump’s threat to suspend the Constitution.

Linked closely to that is a fourth reason: the fact the US is also a masculine political culture. This suggests America is not yet ready for a woman president (a majority of white women voted for Trump, too), and especially not a woman of colour, despite Harris’ moderate politics, fierce intelligence and astonishing accomplishments.

Last, and again linked to the above, is Americans’ love of the fearless maverick whose rugged individualism positions him head and shoulders above all others.

It’s quite the reverse of Australian culture, where the tall poppy gets cut down.

Put simply, American outsiders love Trump’s own description as a fellow outsider (despite being a billionaire) willing to shake up the system.

So how will a second Trump presidency affect Australia?

First, Trump’s victory will stymie Australian exports to the US when the Republicans implement high tariffs.

Our meat, wine and mining industries will be particularly hard hit.

There is also the question of whether the AUKUS agreement will proceed.

More broadly, as Trump inevitably withdraws from Western alliances and cosies up to global dictators, Australia has much to fear as an emboldened Vladimir Putin enjoys free rein in Eastern Europe, China is given space in the South Pacific, and North Korea lets loose in the North Pacific.

But will a swing to the far Right in the US see a similar movement in Australia next May?

Yes and no.

Yes, there will be a swing against the Albanese government because many Australians – still stinging from high grocery prices – blame Albo personally for global inflation.

But, no, not even an arch-conservative Dutton Opposition will not go down the Trump path.

If there is a final lesson for Australian politics, it’s that fear does win more votes than hope.

Originally published as Opinion: Five reasons Americans voted for Trump despite his character flaws