The 2016 election was as historic as President Obama’s election in 2008 but not in a good way. Ta-Nehisi Coates nailed it when he said Trump was the first white president.   His analysis is a brilliant but sobering read.  

In the months leading up to the election I became first angry, alarmed, then scared.  I was angry because the media treated his campaign as just another campaign.   It made me angry that the Hollywood Access tape, a legion of civil suits for financial dirty dealings, his creepy reference to his daughter as a “piece of ass”, “Russia if you are listening”, blatant lies, etc. didn’t phase his supporters.  I was angry with the media for drawing a false equivalency between  Clinton’s emails as if there was not much treated these scandals any one of which should have sunk Trump’s campaign and Donald Trump’s crimes and sleazy escapades.  The closer it got to the election, my anger was replaced with alarm.  Although I thought the race was going to be closer than it ever should be, hence my alarm.  But I thought enough people would refuse to vote for a white supremacist, not with dubious morals but no morals,  no experience and whose behavior and temperament was so far removed from presidential that Clinton would win.  I watched the returns live while things got bleaker and bleaker.  I stayed up until Clinton lost Florida.   I did not wake up on November 8, 2016 as the same person who went to bed the night before.  The election changed me. 

  This is painful.  Up until the election I considered my self an American first, Black second.  I wasn’t always this way.  In my fiery youth I viewed myself as Black first and American second.  But somewhere in my journey from new employee to retiree, I changed.  It may have been that the closer I got to touching (not breaking) the glass ceiling, the more I identified with the people in my orbit. my peers and superiors who were pretty much and most of the time all white.  It could be that as I distanced myself from my struggles earlier in life, I convinced myself that we were doing better than we were.  That I was doing better than I was.  It could have been that I was trying to prove that I belonged and that I deserved my place at the table.  So being an America first meant being accepted and being Black first meant being rejected.  Could be some combination of all of these. It took me days to process the fact that Donald Trump was President of the United States.  I walked around in a fog of disbelief.  I mourned the loss of my naivety as it hit me that I was the fool.  I was busy being American first and Black second.  Most white Americans were and had always been white first and American second.  I just didn’t get the memo.  I fell victim to the trap that ensnares a lot of my generation, our sensitivity to being viewed as un-American. We look different, we were brought here as slaves against our will but we are Americans just like you.  And whites are quick to use the whip of patriotism.  We are called upon as Americans to pay our taxes, go to war, and go to work in the midst of pandemic in a low wage but “essential” job.  But whites who voted for Trump  Trump in overwhelming numbers across all socio-economic strata in 2016 and will do so again in 2020 clearly do not give one fig for America’s ideals or democratic institutions.  They do not care one bit about foreign interference in our election or foreign control of the president.   So long as they get Trump in office and keep him in office.  Why?  Because Trump’s their guy.  When whites talk about the grievances of the white working class, liberal elitism, etc. as Coates says so eloquently, it’s all a smoke screen.  Trump is in office and will be re-electected because he is their guy.  A white President.  They did not elect him despite his racism but because he is a racist.       

Yes, it hurt mightily to find out that my fellow Americans aren’t really my fellow Americans.  They aren;t Americans as I understood what it meant to be an American.  They are whites living in America.  But I resolved to fight back. I plugged into politics like never before in my life. I engaged on social media. I donated to defeat Trump.  But before I did any of that I wrote a letter to My Once Fellow Americans. They never got it but just writing it helped restore my equilibrium. I read my letter again today. After 2 years of Trump, I can say that even I underestimated how far and how fast we would fall.  

Mother Jones, pulling pre-election data from Yougov.com, reported that if only whites voted Trump would have won the electoral college with 389 to 81 votes.  

What would the [2016] election look like if only whites voted? Electoral votes: 81 for Clinton, 389 for Trump, 65 toss-up, 3 unknown*