Nate Silver digs into some really interesting data from Gallup on party ID by age. Here’s the chart at Gallup:
Here’s Nate Silver’s analysis:
What’s interesting, though, is what happens when we look at not these abstract generational categories, but rather at the following question: who was President when you turned 18? As annotated in the chart below, the popularity — or lack thereof — of the President when the voter turned 18 would seem to have a lot of explanatory power for how their politics turned out later on:
It’s common knowledge that demographic trends favor Democrats right now. What Silver’s analysis suggests is that it can be hard to reverse these trends once voting patterns set.
This is why I believe that the Steve Schmidt/Meghan McCain theory that Republicans should pivot away from divisive cultural issues is probably correct. The focus on this turns off younger voters and, when you’ve already turned off eight years of voters, you can’t afford to lose another eight.
TR
But no matter what the age group is, Democrats have a clear advantage over Republicans in terms of party preference?
I guess the Beltway media is correct — we really are a center-right nation.
kommrade reproductive vigor
Bu-but, Jimmy Carter! Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Also!
DonkeyKong
Ahhhhhhhh…..but has Nate Silver polled the unborn? Ha!….victory is ours!-RedState
ps-Kichen detergent is our NEW wedge issue!
DougJ
Yeah, but they’re a little more likely to vote. Dems need a pretty solid advantage to really dominate.
And they seem to be developing one.
Martin
Reagan’s favorability was 60% when I turned 18. I would consider myself honestly conservative which of course means that I should be a Democrat, but I’ve always been a registered independent.
Martin
That’s always been true. Even when Rove was calling on a permanent Republican majority, Dem registration was higher.
JenJen
The gap is the smallest in Gen-X? That’s my cohort, and the finding runs contrary to my perception. Interesting.
Cat Lady
This is good news for John McCain!
/halperin
Punchy
That graph, this news, and Silver’s analysis are all outstanding news for John McCain.
Edit: Damn you Cat Lady (shakes fist)
Napoleon
@JenJen:
That has always been the case, they voted heavily for Reagan. Alex from Family Ties actually exist.
This is a very good related piece Kevin Drum did at the beginning of 08.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2008_01/012847.php#more
blogenfreude
@Cat Lady: You wrecked mine too (This is good news for Rudy! Giuliani!).
Cat Lady
Sorry, couldn’t resist ;>)
Slightly OT, but this is also good news for John McCain:
Why does Richard Clarke hate America?
If Republicans think they can act like the Taliban and scaring the kids is going to get the kids to vote for them, they’re very, very wrong.
LauraM
I’ve been saying this for a long time, actually–the Republicans are in a lot more trouble than they think, unless they get their act together quick, and that’s assuming that it’s not too late already. These first impressions really stick.
This all sounds right to me. I was a Reagan voter when I was 18, my first election. The whole “morning in America” thing had a real appeal, but a big part of it was that the Democrats weren’t looking too great back then. I don’t think they were as bad as the Republicans today, but they weren’t communicating to the rest of us very effectively. They seemed rigid, disorganized, and actually just sort of hapless and incompetent.
My apologies to anyone who was a Democrat at the time! Keep in mind this is from the point of view of someone who, until very recently, wasn’t really interested in politics, so it’s just a general impression really.
Now, you want to know how long it took me to shake that impression of Democrats? Until, um …. last year, probably, listening to Barack Obama. Sad, I know, but remember–not really paying attention to politics much of the time. It took some pretty obvious stuff to make me really re-examine that bad first impression. I mean, Clinton was okay, and the Republicans were being kind of dumb back then, too, but even so when I changed my registration from Republican I changed it to Independent, not Democrat, because somewhere in the back of my mind I still had that idea of them as not being real competent.
And that’s what I think the Republicans are facing now. Even when they do get themselves together, assuming they ever do, this first impression is going to last–and probably especially among those who aren’t paying attention to politics all the time. It’s gonna hurt.
Quick edit to say: JenJen, my younger brother was Alex P. Keaton. I mean, seriously, he was exactly like him.
Napoleon
By the way, I think this demographic fact is absolutely devastating to the Republicans, and if Obama is even moderately popular over 2 terms the result is going to be 30 to 40 years in the wilderness for the right. There will be no way they can overcome the huge wave created over a 6-8 year period (Bush years) followed by a smaller but still significant pro-Dem wave for another 8 year period (Obama’s terms), which 14 to 16 year cohort of voters will be replacing the most pro Republican cohort of the voting public (because they are oldest and can be expected to die first). To the extent Republicans have any any success outside the south and certain places in the west it will be those that distance themselves a million miles away from the wacko social conservative/hard southern conservative members of the party.
By the way something Nate Silver does not mention, and I forget if Drum did, is the young cohort comes in a population group that is as large or larger then the baby boom and its echo cohorts. And they are already voting in historically large % numbers compared to the past, and as they get older that number could only be expected to grow. It is no exaggeration that the Republican party is truly facing a triple wammie demographic tsunami (large cohort/turned off to republican rule/more minorities and women then ever before).
I heard Ruy Teixeira (of the Emerging Democratic Majority fame) say on the radio this week that people still don’t understand how bad it really is for the Republicans.
Napoleon
@LauraM:
Unless the Republicans are happy with being a permanent minority you will see this cause the same thing that happened with the Dems and the DFH. Dem officeholders still (and it will be years before they quite doing this) run like hell if they think they are anywhere near someone that is that is your traditional type leftest. You will see the day that Republicans refuse to take phone calls of people like Pat Roberts/Dobsen/Rush Limbaugh, and company, because in the public’s mind there will be such a strong tendency to believe the Republicans are in the pocket of the wackos.
steve s
What Napoleon said. It’s been known for a few years now that party impressions establish themselves in young adulthood and are very resilient. People who’ve come of age from 2000 to now, and know the GOP as GWB, torture, and gay-bashing, are going strong to the Democrats. Add their future long-term influence to the demographic trends which show the country becoming less white, less south-eastern, less religious, and more educated, and the Religious Right is Seriously Boned.
YAY!
smiley
I skimmed the comments so far so I apologize if I missed someone making the same points I’m about to make: I’ve thought for a long time that most, but of course not all, right-wing pundits are about the same age (40’s). I think Hannity, Ingramham, Beck, Goldberg, K-lo, et al., are all about the same age. They came of age, politically, during the Reagan years. It’s kinda like political imprinting for them. They can’t help it.
DrDick
Hmmmm. Maybe the fact that Nixon was president when I turned 18 explains a great deal. Also the fact that he drafted my ass the next year.
Indylib
@LauraM:
Same here. I was still in high school and it was Reagan’s second term and I don’t think I knew a single person who didn’t vote for him.
I was never a Republican however, always a registered Independent until 2004 when I wanted to vote in the Dem primary in California.
My first political awareness that the Republicans were off their freaking rockers was when I was in college at ASU and that idiot Mecham refused to acknowledge MLK day. And then there was the S&L scandal which included another prominent Arizona politician whom we all love to mock. I think living in Arizona at the time is what started me on the way to becoming much more progressive and liberal than I might have been if I’d lived somewhere else.
The final straw for me, though, as far as taking Republicans seriously, was Clinton’s impeachment.
John Cole
Reagan was President when I turned 18, but Bush 1 was my first vote.
Napoleon
@smiley:
So is Jon Stewart, Keith Olbermann, Colbert and Obama. I am 48 and those guys are all within 2 years of me or so (Kevin Drum also)
LauraM
@Indylib:
That’s what made me go Indy. It was just too stupid.
That’s what gave me the tip-off that “conservatism” wasn’t what I’d thought it was. Either that or it had changed, one or the other. Or at least it should have been the tip-off–I’m not sure I really thought about it a whole lot, and if I did I think it was along the lines of Republicans not being “real” conservatives, just some sort of aberration or something. Eh, I don’t know. But it did turn me off of the party to a great extent.
John Cole
@smiley: K-Lo does not belong in that group, as she is much younger. I think she is six or seven years younger than me and is 31-32.
JL
@John Cole: Gee John, you have certainly voted for a lot of Bushes.
asiangrrlMN
I was out of the country the first time I was eligible to vote, but it would have been for Clinton. Second time, I waited until I saw he had won, and then I voted for Nader. Gore, Kerry, and Obama after that. I never even thought of voting Republican, and I never have. Well, maybe on a local level, but I can’t remember.
As long as the GOP skews even more heavily to the right, they will be less and less relevant.
Wile E. Quixote
@LauraM
That’s because the Democrats were hapless, rigid, disorganized and incompetent. They nominated Walter Mondale, a useless apparatchik who wouldn’t have been out of place in the Politburo and he picked Geraldine Ferraro, who was every bit as much of a non-entity as Harriet Miers, as vice president, and then they whined and wondered why they got their asses handed to them in the biggest electoral landslide in history. Listening to conservatives whine about their losses in the last two elections and their mantra of “conservatism cannot fail, it can only be failed” reminds me of how the Democrats behaved in the 1980s after Reagan kicked their asses, humped their moms and then took all of their lunch money.
I’m waiting for Rick Perlstein’s next book. I met him at a signing of Nixonland* and asked if he was going to write a book about Reagan and he said that he was researching it. Although he’s an unabashed liberal Perlstein has no problems pointing out the incompetence of the Democratic party and he absolutely skewers their performance in the 1968 and 1972 elections, I can’t wait to read his take on the 1976, 1980 and 1984 elections.
I voted for Reagan in 1984 and that’s the last time I voted for a Republican presidential candidate, by 1988 I was so disgusted by Iran/Contra and the War on Some Drugs that I voted Libertarian and by 1992 I was so disgusted by the Republicans that I voted for Clinton, not because I wanted him to win, but because I wanted the Republicans to lose. Barack Obama is the first Democratic presidential candidate I voted for who I wanted to win because I respected him and wanted him in office versus voting for him because I wanted to make sure that the Republicans lost (Yeah, I’m talking about you John Kerry, you hapless, wooden, incompetent fucking hack of a campaigner.)
*Yes, it’s a link to Amazon, if you’re interested go there and buy the goddamned book so John can get some money to keep the site running and more importantly to keep Tunch in food and Furminators**.
**I would have linked to the Furminator too, but for some reason the blogging software doesn’t support more than one hyperlink per post. What’s up with that?
JL
Instead of Reagan, I voted for John Anderson. Reagan just seemed like a preacher to me who said what folks wanted to hear. It was obvious during his second term, that’s what he was. I’ve been voting longer than most of you and here are the winners that I voted for, Clinton, one term and Obama.
Nate Silver should just ask who I’m voting for and go for the other person. My first presidential election, I voted for McGovern. Nixon was just a tad to shady for me.
asiangrrlMN
@JL: You and me both. Obama is the first time the guy for whom I voted became president. Nate can use you and me for his base.
ellie
I am Gen X and I always have been a liberal Democrat. I couldn’t wait to vote against that asshole Reagan. What a dick. The Democrats could have nominated a door knob and I would have voted for it over that phony, washed-up actor. I still don’t understand his appeal. I guess he just told people what they wanted to hear. I have a friend who was very young in the 80s and his only strong memory from that time is that his father lost his job due to Reaganomics and the family received that salty government cheese. He, too, is wildly liberal and says he always will be.
Napoleon
@JL:
I honestly can not recall if I voted Anderson or Carter with my first vote. Regardless, by the end of Ronnie’s first term I was dead set against the Republicans. I had seen enough.
Bob In Pacifica
What’s wrong with the over 85s? They should remember the last Depression? Or maybe they forgot.
J. Michael Neal
Dukakis, Clinton, Dole, Gore, Kerry, Obama
I explain the Dole vote because I knew Clinton was going to win, and I wanted to be able to spend the succeeding four years saying, “Don’t look at me, I voted for the other guy.” The Republicans managed to make even that choice look stupid.
I have moved significantly to the left as I’ve gotten older, though I’m still very much a moderate on a number of issues. My father used to say that the only value of Republicans is that they get the economics right. I’ve had to point out to him that, during my political lifetime, they haven’t even gotten the economics right. He finally agreed with me recently.
He really doesn’t like Al Gore, and I was unable to convince him not to vote libertarian in 2000 as a protest. He’s admitted he was wrong about that, too, but I still remind him from time to time. We were discussing it recently, and I said that I couldn’t believe that I ever thought the Bush administration wouldn’t fuck up Iraq; I knew they were evil, but it never occurred to me that they were this incompetent. Dad said that he knew they were incompetent, but that it never occurred to him that they were this evil.
gbear
Turned 18 in 1972. Voted for McGovern (vs Nixon). I have never voted for a republicanistical candidate for president. I did vote for Dave Durenburger for Senate. Good senator but dumb businessman. Wound up getting denounced by the senate over a book deal and was replaced by the original MN crazy wingnut, Rod Grams (Bachman learned everything from him).
smiley
@Napoleon: @John Cole: I didn’t mean to smear an entire age group. I was in graduate school in the ’80’s and most of my friends and colleagues were afraid of what Reagan might do. I only meant to point out that some people, i.e., those named, with the possible exception perhaps of K-lo, probably started paying attention to politics when St. Ronnie was in office. There are, no doubt, many reasons why they came to worship him. I just think they fell into part of the zeitgeist of that era. Similarly, they seem to go for the patriotic faux country music of that time. I’m in psychology, technically, but this is way out of my area. It’s just an impression I’ve had. Speculation, if you will.
Cat Lady
@J. Michael Neal:
Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Clinton, Clinton, Gore, Kerry, Obama here. Father was an FDR man that got GI Bill benefits, sent his kids to public schools and public colleges, and believed in government as a field leveler – rich people can take care of themselves, he would say, and as far as racism, he would say that a history of having your family literally sold piecemeal would take many many years to mitigate.
I yelled at Reagan on the TV for 8 solid years, and couldn’t believe, COULDN’T BELIEVE, that people couldn’t see through his empty idiocy. Still can’t. Bush, I can’t even describe my despair, but weirdly, if it wasn’t for Bush’s monumental evil hack-tastic incompetence, Obama would be unpossible. So there’s that.
J. Michael Neal
@gbear: Surely you remember what T.G.I.F. stands for, right?
gbear
@J. Michael Neal:
Oh, oh. I only know the standard thank god it’s friday. What am I missing?
J. Michael Neal
@gbear: Tell Grunseth I’m Fourteen
parksideq
De-lurking to put in my two cents as an 18-25 year old. My first vote was an unenthusiastic one for Kerry at 19. By 23, I (along with my entire generation, never mind the majority of the country) was so shell-shocked by the last four years I almost broke the lever in the voting booth in my rush to vote for Obama.
If it’s any indication of how badly the GOP has lost the younger population, my 17 year old brother is still pissed that he wasn’t old enough to vote for Obama last fall. I know it’s anecdotal, but my guess is that if the trend holds, Karl Rove’s wet dream of a permanent majority may possibly be realized. By Democrats.
gbear
@J. Michael Neal:
LOL. Ah yes, I’d put him out of my memory. Google just led me to this amazing NYT article about him and the MN republican party in shambles in 1990. Three days after this article was written, Grunseth had to change his mind and step down from the Governor’s race. Another great tidbit found while snooping around: “(Tim) Pawlenty’s start in state politics began as a campaign advisor for Jon Grunseth’s 1990 losing bid for Minnesota governor. His connections to Grunseth’s former wife, Vicky Tigwell, would later involve him in an ethics and accountability call with his private employment in 2003.”
PS: Pawlenty just vetoed the budget bill that the house and senate had worked out (without help from TPaw) because it had ‘tax increases’. He’s still batting 1000 for Nordquist. Fucking dink.
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
who was President when you turned 18?
Reagan, at the absolute peak of his popularity.
So it’s not a perfect predictor. I’ve never voted for non-Democrats for president except to protest-vote Socialist or other mega-lefty.
b-psycho
I turned 18 in Clinton’s last year. Voted for Harry Browne in 2000, and for principle reasons (realization that trying to reform the State is like trying to wean a tiger off of meat) haven’t bothered since.
Read into that whatever you want.
PGE
I turned 18 in ’74, but didn’t vote till ’84. Basically because I was so horrified by St. Ronnie that it politicized me. I’ve voted D in every election since (though my favored candidate has never made it out of the primaries.) I almost protest-voted for Nader in 2000, but the race in Wisconsin was too close and I wasn’t willing to take a chance. God, I’m glad I don’t have to admit to ever having voted for that tool.
NCReggie
I was nineteen when the Johns (Kerry-Edwards) began their craptastic campaign. Still remember back in ’04 when Iraq was literally the battle of armageddon to a lot of conservative folks. Second time around I voted for obama twice; in the NC primary and the general election. Still amazed NC turned blue, bush won in ’04 by 12 frickin points.
Walker
I am a Gen-X anti-Reaganite here. It is because I have always been a financial conservative, something which the Republicans (despite their lies to the contrary) have never been during my political lifetime. Clinton was more fiscally conservative than Reagan.
NCReggie
oh yea to alot of the older folks what exactly was reagan’s appeal? the whole he destroyed the evil empire with defense spending was bullshit and shouldn’t Iran Contra gotten his ass axed?
dr. luba
I think that, to a large degree, our political leanings (left v. right) are inborn. Party identification is another thing. The “President when you’re 18” applies to the latter, and generally for those who are moderates (the mushy middle). No righty is going to be a Democrat, at least nowadays, just as no lefty will choose the Repubs.
Even though I was raised in a Republican environment, I have always been a lefty, and, since the Reagan Era, a democrat. My first vote was for Eugene McCarthy in 1976; I found Jimmy Carter too religious for my liking. (He’s grown on me since.) Clinton was the first winner I voted for in a presidential election. I’d gotten so used to losing that his win came as a huge surprise to me. It felt so weird to actually back a winner……
Porlock Junior
@Cat Lady
Same here. If you add Johnson, Humphrey, McGovern. Eisenhower was president when I turned 18, but 18 wasn’t the number back then, so I’m not sure how that works.
As to Reagan’s inexplicable popularity, I think it’s not to be looked for in political terms at all. It required some amount of judgment, and sometimes effort, not to like the man. Enormous aw-shucks charm when he turned it on. How many Presidents have we had who, on the operating table after a near-successful assassination attempt, quoted W. C. Fields: “I’d rather be in Philadelphia”? In reaction, to avoid the temptation, people with functioning political brains loathed him all the more, if that was possible; while the public adored him.
(Why did the Republicans have such violent hatred for Bill Republican Lite Clinton, as if he were some kind of flaming radical? Same reason: too likable. Heck, I can’t help liking him, and I don’t even like the man.)
In other news, and in fairness to the over-85s: who is sure of the party choices of that small demographic? The over-85s I’ve known have been old New Dealers. Except for the old Communists: still a lively and feisty bunch so long as the flesh permits it. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a lot of that in the USA, though not in the South.
BTW, a mile from here there is a very pleasant retirement home, located by a major intersection. Most afternoons, a bunch of the residents can be seen out there waving anti-war signs and rainbow flags, and the passing motorists honk their appreciation.
BombIranForChrist
The additional problem the Republicans face is Obama. Assuming Obama maintains some baseline of charisma and success, the Republicans are going to have a really hard time winning the youth vote even if they DO drop their social issues.
So they face seemingly insurmountable odds as far as winning the youth vote:
1. They need to somehow convince their ultra-right core constituency to drop what they care about.
2. They have to be more attractive than the youthful and charismatic Obama.
Not going to happen.
tammanycall
Some articles tell me I am Gen X, some say I’m Gen Y. Should I be an alt kid or a social media addict?
Decisions, decisions…
Xenos
Another anti-Reagan gen-xer. I never understood why my peers went for Reagan’s shtick, as he was so obviously a complete phony. But there was no joy in voting for Mondale.
But people like to back winners, and Republicans branded themselves that way pretty successfully. And Reagan’s cheesey patriotism was attractive to our generation of kids of Korean War vets. We did not have such a generation gap with our parents, but rather learned to resent boomers, and boomers to us meant the DFHs. Think of Neil in The Young Ones. I have got to find the DVDs for that show…
Blue Raven
I was raised a yellow dog Democrat. Came of legal voting age during the last half of Reagan’s second term, thus a first-wave GenXer. My Presidential picks were Dukakis, Libertarian (Ron Paul?), Libertarian, Gore, Kerry, Obama. But in my heart of hearts, I was mostly attempting to help boost a third party while being glad to be sure Clinton was going to beat the Republican because I’ve always preferred having a Dem in charge.
And as a side note, not only is Nate’s GenY bracket dubious, so is his Boomer bracket. The real baby boom ended around ’56 or so, so those who have just turned 50 in the last few years are a generation all their own. Different mentality due to changed social pressures.
WereBear
I found out recently I’m Gen Jones, after being lumped in with Boomers all these years.
Damn you social scientists :)!
Always been a lefty, because the DFH were right about so many things.
I think a factor that always sways the mushy middle is a likeable, charismatic candidate, even if they say utterly stupid things. In a lot of ways, President is a popularity contest. Stop some random person and ask them the issues, and how it works via policy.
You’ll stand there a long time before you get a right answer.
bob h
My advice for the Republicans is to say and do nothing for the next eight years at least. Just be cheerful and concede that they are out of power for a generation at least. All they do is dig themselves a bigger hole.
EriktheRed
Well, I’m one voter who doesn’t fit the above.
I turned 18 in 1984, when Ronny Reagan was über-popular and voted for him in his landslide re-election. That was the first and last time I ever voted for a GOoPer for POTUS. It didn’t take long for me to realize that this was NOT the way for our country to go in the long run.
superdestroyer
The real question is what will be politics and governance be like the U.S. as the U.S. becomes a one party state. Why have Democratic Party primaries six months before a general election when there will be no competitive elections in the general election.
As the U.S. become a one party state, maybe the acitivst should push to get rid of seniority in the U.S. House and Senate. With only one party, the power will go to states and districts that keep election the same person for decades.
Shell Goddamnit
I’ve been saying for years that people treat politics like religion: something they learn when young and never really manage to shake off; held as an article of faith rather than arrived at by any kind of cogitation. But it still bothers to hear that there are so many who apparently pick up their politics by some kind of osmotic accident. Who teaches political science & why isn’t our chirren learning any whatsoever? (answers: 1. no one and 2. that would be part of the reason, yes)
voldemortsgirl
Speaking as a Gen Y girl, I would agree with Silver that my generation is not as pro-Dem as anti-Republican. Most of the people in my cohort believe in community service, making a difference, a more communal experience – all of which Obama emphasized in his campaign. But we are also fiscal conservatives, we don’t believe too much in government programs and social liberals. Just as an anecdote, I had a completely apolitical friend who was going to vote “Green” to make a statement of his independence ( I dissuaded him, thankfully and he ended up voting for Obama). But the first thing he asked is who is advocating for gay marriage? That was basically the only thing he was passionate about because he thought of it as a human issue instead of a political issue. People in my cohort are COMPLETELY TURNED OFF by this demonization of gays. We KNOW people who are gay, they are our friends not some “other”. The stupid flower child crap in the elections completely turned us off as well. Also, we loved the fact that Obama spoke our language though most people I know don’t agree with his policies. He was in a way one of us. I believe democratic identification would go down if he was no longer president and if the republicans stopped freaking out about teh gays. Its completely stupid.
Cugel
It’s all about Demographics.
If you look at those historical electoral maps on Wikipedia you see some amazing things: JFK’s main strength was in the Deep South! Rural working class whites in TX, LA, GA, SC, AR, TN, WV as well as Northern liberals in NY, MA, & PA. The “Solid South” was the bastion of the FDR New Deal Coalition.
It disappeared because of Southern White resentment of the Civil Rights movement, the anti-war movement, the feminist movement and the counter-culture. Northern working class-whites joined once they began to feel the pinch of job exporting industires (and blamed immigrants) and the Nixon-Reagan Coalition was born that allowed conservatives to dominate for 20 years. Even after 1988, conservative IDEAS dominated right up till 2006.
In 1972, the “McGovern coalition” included: middle-class women, minorities, under 30 voters, seldom and non-church-goers, Labor and urban-dwellers. That was 37.5% of the electorate and McGovern won MA & the District of Columbia for a grand total of 17 electoral votes.
In 2008 Obama won with basically the same coalition, except that he had 53% of the electorate and won 29 states with 365 electoral votes.
What happened?
Mostly, minority voting increased as minorities move inexorably towards majority status and Republicans did everything they could to demonize and alienate minorities. (“English Only” “Secure our Borders”! Code word racist attacks on: “Welfare Queens! Crime! Willie Horton!” etc.)
America also has been growing more and more urban, as rural America declines.
The Southern Strategy no longer works and the Republican party doesn’t have anything else.
Their core constituencies are still “angry whites” — primarily rural, primarily hostile to “immigrants” and minorities, anti-abortion, fundamentalist religious intolerance, etc.
It’s an ugly stew that is profoundly alienating to the rest of America. It’s one thing to race bait “Willie Horton” and campaign against “crime” i.e. BLACK crime, when blacks are less than 10% of voters and Hispanics, Asians and others are a negligible percentage. It’s a very DIFFERENT thing when black/Latino/Asian, other constitutes 27% of the vote and rising at the rate of around 1% a year — and you’ve so demonized these voters that close to 90% of them vote Democratic.
There is just NO chance at all for Republicans to recover until they can attract much higher percentages of minorities, and there’s NO chance they will make the effort so long as their Nativist, racist, intolerant base has anything to say about it.