Minority voters lift Obama
Waning white influence poses trouble for GOP
WASHINGTON — Even more than the election that made Barack Obama the first black president, the one that returned him to office sent an unmistakable signal that the hegemony of the straight white male in America is over.
The long drive for broader social participation by all Americans reached a turning point in the 2012 election, which is likely to go downas a watershed in the nation’s social and political evolution, and not just because in some states voters approved of same- sex marriage for the first time.
On Tuesday, Obama received the votes of barely1in 3 white males. It almost certainlywas anall- time low for the winner of a presidential election that did not include a major third- party candidate.
“We’re not in the ’ 50s anymore,” said William Frey, aBrookings Institution demographer. “This election makes it clear that a single focus directed at white males, or at the white population in general, is not going to do it. And it’s not going to do it when the other party is focusing on energizing everybody else.”
Exit- poll data, gathered from interviews with voters as they left their polling places, showed that Obama’s support from whites was 4 percentage points lower than 2008. But he drew on a minority- voter base thatwas 2 percentage points larger as a share of the overall electorate than four years ago.
The president built his winning coalition on a series of election- year initiatives and issue differences with Republican challenger Mitt Romney. In the months leading up to the election, Obama announced his support for same- sex marriage, unilaterally granted a form of limited legalization to young, undocumented immigrants and put abortion rights and contraception at the heart of a brutally effective anti- Romney ad campaign.
The result turned out to be an unbeatable combination: overwhelming support from black voters, who turned out as strongly as in 2008, plus decisive backing frommembersof the younger and fast- growing Latino and Asian- American communities, who chose Obama over Romney by ratios of roughly 3- to- 1. All of those groups contributed to Obama’s majority among women.
Obamaplanted his base in an America that is inexorably becoming more diverse. Unchecked by Republicans, these trends would give the Democrats a significant edge in future presidential elections.
Latinos were an essential element of Obama’s victories in the battlegrounds of Nevada and Colorado. States once considered reliably Republican will likely become highly competitive because of burgeoning Hispanic populations, sometimes in combination with large black populations. North Carolina, whereObamawon narrowly in 2008 and came close this time, is one. Georgia is another. Texas and Arizona are future swing states, by 2020, if not sooner.
Democrats, though, face a potentially serious threat from the loss of white votes. “I don’t think you can be a major party and get down to support approaching only a third of the white population,” said demographer Frey. “In someways, maybe, Obamadodged a bullet here. If theRepublicans hadmade a little bit of an effort toward minorities and kept their focus on whites, they might havewon.”
Without Obama on the ticket, socially conservative African- American voters might have been more inclined to follow the urgings of their ministers, whoasked them to stay home to protest the Democrats’ endorsement of gay marriage.
But the Republican Party’s problems are more immediate, and much tougher to solve. Some GOP strategists have longwarned about the risks of hitching the party’s fortunes to a shrinking share of the electorate.
Florida Sen. MarcoRubio, who combines tea party pedigree with Latino heritage, said in a postelection statement that “the conservative movement should have particular appeal to people in minority and immigrant communities ... and Republicans need to work harder than ever to communicate our beliefs to them.”
Romney’s chances ultimately depended on turning out a bigger white vote against Obama than Republican nominees received in earlier races. Eightyearsago, President George W. Bush defeated Democrat John Kerry by 17 percentage points among white voters and won re- election. This year, Romney took the white vote by 20 percentage points — and lost.