Trump Rides a Blue-Collar Wave

The biggest surprise of the presidential election so far is the emergence and persistent strength of Donald Trump. Although Ben Carson is remarkable in many respects, he is the latest iteration of a familiar figure in Republican primary campaigns: the favored candidate of conservative evangelicals.

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By contrast, Mr. Trump is the staunchest champion of the white working class that American politics has seen in decades. Thanks to a recently released survey, a collaboration between the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and the Brookings Institution, we can now identify with much greater precision the sources of Mr. Trump’s support and the sentiments of his supporters. More...

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