What I've Noticed About Trump Supporters

First for the retrospective: This week marks one year since Donald Trump announced his 2016 presidential campaign. In the first poll conducted entirely after his formal campaign launch, an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, Trump was at 1%. Ted Cruz and John Kasich, his final two opponents, were at 4% and 1% respectively, and Jeb Bush was leading the field by five points. What a difference a year makes.

Since then I’ve noticed a few things about Trump supporters (by this I mean those who supported him in the primary). Not the kind on TV or giving interviews, but real, ordinary people I’ve known for long before June 14, 2015. And there are a few things they all have in common.

Many of them are older, most over fifty. Among those older voters, there is actually a pretty even split between men and women, but the Trump voters under fifty are entirely male—I don’t know any women under fifty who supported Trump before he clinched the nomination. Again, this may not be true of all Trump supporters, but it is of those I know personally.

But more important than demographics is general voter attitude. I would describe all of these people as conservative, but they generally acknowledge Trump is not. This doesn’t seem to bother them, however—one describes Trump as a “change agent”, and the others generally agree with that description, seeing him as a convenient vehicle for change. They are also angry with Republicans, Congress, and government in general, which ties back to the idea of Trump as a “change agent”. When I worked, until recently, in a DC Congressional office, the letters and phone calls we received that mentioned the presidential race fit the same profile—they all described their anger over various issues, and concluded by saying, “This is why Donald Trump is doing so well.” And I believe them.

The question remains, however, just what kind of change Donald Trump will bring. I think many of those who supported him during the primary will be sorely disappointed as far as 1) how much change he actually intends to bring, and 2) whether what he does bring is the sort many of his followers are hoping and voting for.