The Democrats’ Class Gap Problem
It’s not going away.
It’s not exactly news that Democrats have a yawning working-class hole in their coalition. Over time, they have shed both white and nonwhite working-class (noncollege) voters, while improving among college-educated voters—though it has varied by election which sector of the working class has contributed the most to Democratic losses. In 2024, it was nonwhite working-class voters. Given the policies and rhetoric of the Trump administration might it be possible that the pointer this election moves back to the white working class, leaving the Democrats’ class gap in support as large or larger than ever?
It might! In the latest New York Times/Siena poll, white college voters say they’ll vote Democratic in 2026 by 16 points (two-party vote), while white working-class voters favor the Republicans by 34 points. That makes for a 50-point class gap among whites, about doubling the analogous class gaps from 2024 and 2022 Congressional voting (28 and 24 points, respectively). The NYT/Siena poll shows a similarly-sized class gap in net Trump approval (approval minus disapproval) among whites—white college graduates lopsidedly disapprove of Trump, while the white working class lopsidedly approve.
Other data from the poll underscore this gap. On specific issues, white working-class voters approve of Trump’s handling of the economy by 25 points (compared to net 20 points disapproval among white college grads); on handling immigration, it’s net 27 points approval vs. net 24 points disapproval; on managing the federal government, it’s 28 points net approval vs. 24 points net disapproval; and on crime, it’s a whopping 33 points net approval among the white working class vs. 13 points net disapproval among white college voters.
Views on recent high profile policy issues are consistent with these ratings. By 40 points (69-29 percent), white working-class voters support “deporting immigrants living in the United States illegally back to their home countries”, while white college grads are split evenly. A similar gap can be seen on “the deployment of National Guard troops in Washington, D.C.” White working-class voters support the move by 21 points (55-34 percent), while white college voters are opposed by 23 points (60-37 percent).
And white college grads are highly likely to think the Trump has “gone too far” in these and similar areas: 58 percent think his immigration enforcement actions have gone too far, 59 percent feel the same about sending National Guard troops into big cities and 57 think pressuring colleges and universities has gone too far. In contrast, just 34 percent, 37 percent and 28 percent of the white working class, respectively, think the president has gone too far in these areas (the rest think what he’s done is about right or, more commonly, that he hasn’t gone far enough).
Finally, here’s a result from the poll that crystallizes this chasm in attitudes between white working-class and college voters. Voters were given a choice between these two statements about Trump’s time in office so far: “Donald Trump is cleaning up chaos and disorder,” or “Donald Trump is creating chaos and disorder.” By 25 points (61-36 percent), white working-class voters think he’s getting rid of chaos and disorder, while white college-grad voters are almost exactly the reverse; by 27 points (63-36 percent) they think Trump is creating chaos and disorder. Interesting!
When you think about it, this pattern of results makes a great deal of sense. Since Trump’s election, Democrats have spent their limited political capital on resisting Trump’s every move and denouncing them in the most histrionic terms—with the clear implication that anyone with mixed feelings or (worse) qualified support for some of his moves is enabling the destruction of democracy and the unleashing of evil upon the land. This is catnip for white college-grad voters, the one demographic among whom Democrats have made progress since the Obama years. But among white working-class voters, the Democrats’ perennial problem demographic, who strongly distrust the Democrats and feel that it’s about time someone did something about the problems Trump is addressing, this approach plays far less well.
Of course, Democrats since the election have been talking nonstop about the need to reach working-class voters. They’re not unaware their party is increasingly a vehicle for educated professionals, whose priorities are quite different and frequently opposed to those of vast sectors of the working class. They’re just not willing to do much about it except proclaim their deep affection for the working class and assure them they are on their side and are really, really concerned about the cost of living. Efforts to materially change the image of the party on difficult cultural issues have been assiduously avoided, save the occasional and tentative suggestion that perhaps those with unorthodox (or, heaven forfend, conservative) views should not be immediately drummed out of the party.
This is not adequate for closing the class gap and convincing working-class voters that they and the Democratic Party are on the same page. Not even close. A NYT/Ipsos poll found this disjuncture between Democratic priorities and personal priorities back in January:
A new poll from the Searchlight Institute shows little has changed since the NYT/Ipsos January poll. Three of the top four Democratic issue priorities are still seen as climate change, LGBTQ+ issues, and abortion (though climate change is now at the top, not abortion) and immigration and crime are at the bottom of the priority list.
Plus ça change plus c’est la même chose. The Democrats’ implicit white college-grad play might well work in the 2026 House elections, where their odds of taking enough seats to shift control look good. But it’s a lot less likely to work for the Senate, where Democrats need to pick up four seats and successfully defend all their incumbents including in Michigan (52 percent white working class among eligible voters according to States of Change estimates) and New Hampshire (55 percent). The Democrats’ target seats include must-have Maine (61 percent white working class), almost-certainly-needed Ohio (55 percent) and if-they-can’t-get-Texas Iowa (61 percent). Daunting!
Getting the love from white college voters may not be enough to scale this mountain. Or succeed in 2028 for that matter. The clock is ticking.
I hear a lot about the Democrats’ messaging problem. Well, duh. Democrats (1) have no vision for the country that does not include rule by right-thinking technocrats, (2) have lied and obfuscated about critically important issues for years (Biden’s cognitive state, inflation, immigration, et al) so have zero credibility outside their core activists , and (3) have demonstrated their willingness to dismiss the beliefs of over half the country in order to pursue a victim mentality and satisfy a small vocal minority. I submit that the Democrats’ problems go way beyond messaging.
It seems that working class voters prioritize economic issues while the college educated prioritize cultural issues. The only real economic issue in the perception of the Democrats is health care and even there the hill the Democrats have picked to die on in the shutdown is health care for illegal immigrants, This pushes the issue back into the cultural category. (Or worse, ghosts 12M of the people with fully subsidized premiums had 0 claims of any kind in 2024.) Democrats try to dress up climate change as economics but the public is buying it. It is the reverse watermelon issue that was covered here last weekend. At some point, Democrats need to choose and decide who they are.