Virtually half the voting population reliably cast their ballots for Democrat candidates, despite the evidence they oppose much of the party platform: open immigration, open voting, gender affirming care.  What motivates them?

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One must dispense with a discussion of gerrymandering and ballot harvesting in addressing voter motivation.  Such maneuvering might well explain why Democrats win elections, but not what makes people willfully vote for Democrat candidates.

The reasons stem primarily from personal grievances against “the system,” which are externalized rather than resolved internally.

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The Democrat base has distinct subsets:

The young:  Idealistic by nature.  Indoctrinated, indulged, introspective, self-immersed, career-oriented yet anxious, depressed over cultural chaos and a fading American Dream.  They seek work/life balance.  The rewards of capitalism with the security of socialism — the siren call of the Democrat socialists.

The subjugated:  Women conflicted by the feminist movement and their biological role.  Women outnumber men in the workforce, yet earn less and head few Fortune 500 companies.  Rebellion against the patriarchy, toxic masculinity, and the glass ceiling.

The paranoid:  Those threatened by perceived challenges beyond their control.  Global warming, fascism, return of Jim Crow, hate speech, triggers, microaggressions, bullying, abortion access, rape culture, vaccine deniers.  Insecure disciples of woke and cancel culture.

The guilty:  Affluent urban and suburbanites who have successfully navigated the system, but harbor guilt over their white privilege.  They need to project an aura of compassion for the less fortunate with virtue signaling and support of progressive candidates.

The underachievers:  Those innately or culturally ill-equipped to compete in a free enterprise system.  They seek support from the party that offers them free health care, free education, guaranteed wages, DEI.

Trump haters/TDS:  Not a separate category, but an overlay of those opposed to the quintessential white, patriarchal, nationalist, capitalist — DT.  He is emblematic of the system that is rigged against them and a major obstacle to their quest for “social justice.”

Although not a homogeneous lot, Democrat voters do share a certain basic characteristic, namely dissidence and anger directed against a socioeconomic system which they view as an obstacle to realization of their goals and expectations.  Their feelings of oppression give rise to frustration and anger which trigger emotionally based reactions, ranging from petulance to violence, to any issue confronting them.  Taking a “blame game” position, they externalize their angst against their societal oppressors, defined by identity politics, whom they conflate with conservatives and the Republican Party — a structure dominated by white, male, capitalist elitists.  They are voting against the system and for anyone promising to bring it down, no matter what else he or she may advocate.

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Having abandoned prior attempts to blend into “the system,” leftist activist insurgents now seek to overturn and replace it.  “Change America!”  Their followers have responded to their calling with increasing radicalization — cancel culture, lawfare, rioting, election of socialist candidates, assassination of conservative figures.  Lacking self-reliance, they seek group solidarity, the big tent, to fight for their rights.  They look to the Democrat party for security and revenge.  Ironically, if the system is indeed rigged against them, it is done so largely at the behest of the corrupt, opportunistic, increasingly radical politicians they look to for hope and change.  Catch-22.

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Image generated by ChatGPT.