Vance’s Election Clincher: Reaching Non-White 'Forgotten Americans'
In the closing days of the campaign, vice presidential nominee JD Vance has become an electoral asset for Team Trump. Polling and anecdotes from pollsters like Frank Lutz suggest Vance has persuaded voters reticent on Trump.
Throughout his months-long introduction to much of America, Vance has leaned heavily on his biography, and for good reason; his rise from a tough Rust Belt background to the U.S. Senate symbolizes America’s promise, but also our failure to deliver for so many of our citizens.
But as the campaign comes to an end in crucial vote-rich territories like my home city of Philadelphia, Vance can deliver a knockout punch for Team Trump – if he expands his moniker of “forgotten Americans” beyond the ones he grew up with. Many forgotten Americans are, like Vance, white Rust Belt voters, essential to Trump’s shock 2016 victories in Pennsylvania, as well as Michigan and Wisconsin. These voters are already in the Republican camp.
But millions of these voters from all corners of our country exist outside the current Republican base. So who are they?
They’re working black moms in North Philadelphia, who have to step over needles from “safe” syringe exchanges to pick their kids up from schools that are getting worse, thanks to Democratic policymakers.
They’re Asian convenience shop owners from Dallas to Durham who came to our country to work hard for the next generation – but whose stores have become sites of frequent looting as “progressive” prosecutors have declined to punish shoplifting.
And they’re Hispanic and Native American oil and gas workers from New Mexico to the Rio Grande who have been put out of work due to drilling moratoriums, just as the cost of living has skyrocketed.
Like the people of Middleton, these voters have been passed over. They have not prospered under the Biden-Harris Administration. Policies that serve the Democrats’ base of upper-educated urban elites – like off-shoring manufacturing labor to cheaper markets, lax law enforcement, and opening the border to millions who undercut their wages – have hurt them economically and socially. And they’re becoming more Republican as-is: working non-white voters have quietly abandoned the Democrats, shifting Republican by double-digits in the last decade.
Vance is helping Republicans lean into this trend, from a summer visit to Philadelphia where he widened his message to include black business owners: “Do you think the black business leaders in Minneapolis … are grateful that Tim Walz allowed rioters to burn down their businesses?” Even better was his articulate response in Detroit to the question of why black voters should support Trump-Vance: “The story of black Americans … is actually very similar to the story of Appalachian white Americans: we moved to places like Detroit, black and white together, because there were good jobs for people who were willing to work hard and play by the rules.”
In the home stretch, Vance should continue to lean in for Republicans to seal the deal, and help expand Trump’s coattails to needed Senate and Congressional races, including in Pennsylvania.
Because if Republicans want to win over more of these voters – many millions more – we must win hearts and minds, and not just win the argument. The first task at hand is to recognize the opportunity; where Democrats feel they “own” blocks of voters, there is simmering discontent. Republicans should show up and make a direct appeal to the forgotten among us. This includes using campaign resources to make direct appeals where these voters are getting their information: Asian print publications, Spanish-language radio, black churches. As a Republican strategist, this act of putting our money where our mouth is is far too often overlooked, though the cost of such outreach is marginal in a major campaign.
Finally, we must show we actually care – not just that we’re right, but that we care, and specifically about people outside of our traditional base. This involves appealing to the heart and not just the head, and sharing our values and how our policies will lift people up and improve our communities. Where voters feel forgotten, we need to tell them that we see what they are going through, and do not take them for granted. After all, their votes will decide this election.
With a unique background, messaging skills, and a clear understanding of the need for a more heartfelt appeal, JD Vance is in the perfect position to flip the last tranche of undecided voters across Pennsylvania and other swing states. He’ll do it by continuing to expand his message to channel these other forgotten Americans – and welcoming them into the new, multiracial, working GOP base.
