The US is now in its fourth week of mass protests against institutional racism and police brutality. Substantive debates about police reform – including formerly radical proposals to “defund the police” – have entered the mainstream political discussion and in some cases already achieved political traction. While it is still early, and history is a warning against too much optimism, it seems clear that the protests in the wake of the brutal murder of George Floyd are producing more, and more concrete, results than similar recent protests did.
Surprisingly, these changes are being achieved despite the White House being occupied by the most outspoken supporter of white supremacy it has seen in decades. Donald Trump has not just emboldened the racist fringes of the US, but reshaped the Republican party in his own image. The situation presents an interesting question: why and how have protesters achieved so much more under a far-right white president than they were able to achieve, after the Ferguson protests, under a liberal black president?
A first reason is that the president is not the all-powerful politician that many people inside and outside of America assume. While the president has become more powerful over time, his powers are still limited by a broad range of powerful institutions, including Congress, the supreme court, and federalism. On many issues the president has the power to initiate, and veto, but not pass policies.
Another reason is that, despite the popular rightwing caricature of Barack Obama as a radical Muslim socialist, so tirelessly propagated by the Tea Party movement, Obama was in general very reluctant to use his limited political capital to fight institutional racism. Well aware of the historical importance of being the first black president, and the anxieties and backlash this created among many white Americans, he was cautious in his critiques of institutional racism, let alone in introducing substantial reform, afraid to be dismissed as an “identity politics” politician.
But contextual and structural factors also help explain the difference. The current protests take place in a very different political context from those in the wake of the police killing of Michael Brown in August 2014. The country is coming out of an unprecedented lockdown; 40 million Americans have been thrown into unemployment; it is the beginning of the summer; and both the coronavirus pandemic and the related economic crisis have disproportionately affected the black community. Not to forget that we’re in the run-up to a presidential election.
The current protests also build upon previous protests, including those in the wake of the acquittal of the killer of Trayvon Martin in 2013, which birthed the Black Lives Matter movement, and those in the wake of the terrorist attack in Charleston in 2015, which sparked fundamental debates about Confederate flags and statues, albeit primarily in the south. Each protest pushes the dial a bit further, normalizing arguments and changes – although sometimes they also unleash a backlash.
Most importantly, the current protests are part of three and a half years of progressive protests against the Trump presidency, in which anti-racism has always been a key factor. This includes the many protests against Trump’s nativist policies, including the travel ban targeting Muslim-majority countries, as well as the annual Women’s Marches. Recall that the first Women’s March, in January 2017, was the largest single-day protest in US history.
Of course the left wing takes more to the streets under a rightwing government, and vice versa – where is the Tea Party protesting against budget deficits and big government under Trump? There is nothing specifically American about this. We have seen it for decades in Europe as well, even though lately the far right also protests against center-right governments.
Obama came to power after eight years of growing progressive frustration with George W Bush, focused primarily, but certainly not exclusively, on his foreign military operations. But the anti-war protests came to an almost complete halt when Obama assumed the presidency, even though America’s military imperialism barely decreased. Similarly, more undocumented immigrants were deported under the last years of Obama’s presidency than under Trump, but protests were rare and small.
We should not make this mistake again. If Biden is able to defeat Trump in November – despite hopeful polls, this will require a massive mobilization – progressives should not abandon the streets yet again and lose the momentum for fundamental reforms. I am not so much talking about the Bernie or Bust crowd, which won’t feel that it has an ally in the White House anyway, but about progressives who support what could be called the Democratic establishment.
As we saw in the first two years of the Obama presidency, in which the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress but got preciously little done, the new president will face instant and intense pressure from congressional Republicans as well as Wall Street donors. There is a fair chance that few progressives will have regular access to the new president. Protests in the streets, or fear thereof, might be a useful reminder to Biden that his support is conditional and that his real work remains to be done.
Why antiracist protests are achieving more progress under Trump than Obama
Cas Mudde
Between Trump, Covid-19, and police brutality, America is a perfect political storm. But the left must keep fighting even if Biden wins
Photograph: Justin Lane/EPA
The US is now in its fourth week of mass protests against institutional racism and police brutality. Substantive debates about police reform – including formerly radical proposals to “defund the police” – have entered the mainstream political discussion and in some cases already achieved political traction. While it is still early, and history is a warning against too much optimism, it seems clear that the protests in the wake of the brutal murder of George Floyd are producing more, and more concrete, results than similar recent protests did.
Surprisingly, these changes are being achieved despite the White House being occupied by the most outspoken supporter of white supremacy it has seen in decades. Donald Trump has not just emboldened the racist fringes of the US, but reshaped the Republican party in his own image. The situation presents an interesting question: why and how have protesters achieved so much more under a far-right white president than they were able to achieve, after the Ferguson protests, under a liberal black president?
A first reason is that the president is not the all-powerful politician that many people inside and outside of America assume. While the president has become more powerful over time, his powers are still limited by a broad range of powerful institutions, including Congress, the supreme court, and federalism. On many issues the president has the power to initiate, and veto, but not pass policies.
Another reason is that, despite the popular rightwing caricature of Barack Obama as a radical Muslim socialist, so tirelessly propagated by the Tea Party movement, Obama was in general very reluctant to use his limited political capital to fight institutional racism. Well aware of the historical importance of being the first black president, and the anxieties and backlash this created among many white Americans, he was cautious in his critiques of institutional racism, let alone in introducing substantial reform, afraid to be dismissed as an “identity politics” politician.
But contextual and structural factors also help explain the difference. The current protests take place in a very different political context from those in the wake of the police killing of Michael Brown in August 2014. The country is coming out of an unprecedented lockdown; 40 million Americans have been thrown into unemployment; it is the beginning of the summer; and both the coronavirus pandemic and the related economic crisis have disproportionately affected the black community. Not to forget that we’re in the run-up to a presidential election.
The current protests also build upon previous protests, including those in the wake of the acquittal of the killer of Trayvon Martin in 2013, which birthed the Black Lives Matter movement, and those in the wake of the terrorist attack in Charleston in 2015, which sparked fundamental debates about Confederate flags and statues, albeit primarily in the south. Each protest pushes the dial a bit further, normalizing arguments and changes – although sometimes they also unleash a backlash.
Most importantly, the current protests are part of three and a half years of progressive protests against the Trump presidency, in which anti-racism has always been a key factor. This includes the many protests against Trump’s nativist policies, including the travel ban targeting Muslim-majority countries, as well as the annual Women’s Marches. Recall that the first Women’s March, in January 2017, was the largest single-day protest in US history.
Of course the left wing takes more to the streets under a rightwing government, and vice versa – where is the Tea Party protesting against budget deficits and big government under Trump? There is nothing specifically American about this. We have seen it for decades in Europe as well, even though lately the far right also protests against center-right governments.
Obama came to power after eight years of growing progressive frustration with George W Bush, focused primarily, but certainly not exclusively, on his foreign military operations. But the anti-war protests came to an almost complete halt when Obama assumed the presidency, even though America’s military imperialism barely decreased. Similarly, more undocumented immigrants were deported under the last years of Obama’s presidency than under Trump, but protests were rare and small.
We should not make this mistake again. If Biden is able to defeat Trump in November – despite hopeful polls, this will require a massive mobilization – progressives should not abandon the streets yet again and lose the momentum for fundamental reforms. I am not so much talking about the Bernie or Bust crowd, which won’t feel that it has an ally in the White House anyway, but about progressives who support what could be called the Democratic establishment.
As we saw in the first two years of the Obama presidency, in which the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress but got preciously little done, the new president will face instant and intense pressure from congressional Republicans as well as Wall Street donors. There is a fair chance that few progressives will have regular access to the new president. Protests in the streets, or fear thereof, might be a useful reminder to Biden that his support is conditional and that his real work remains to be done.
Cas Mudde is the Stanley Wade Shelton UGAF professor of international affairs at the University of Georgia, the author of The Far Right Today (2019), and host of the new podcast Radikaal