Partisanship, emotions and violence in US presidential election

Is the voter angry at the candidate and thus chooses the opposing one? Do the emotions affect the result of the election? Do the decisions of heart overweight the conclusions of the brain in the presidential election?

Authors of the psychological review ‘Emotions and Politics: Noncognitive Psychological Biases in Public Opinion’, Steven W. Webster and Bethany Albertson noted that in democratic countries people have strong dedication and loyalty to a specific party which can coexist with a negative attitude towards the opposing party. This concept of partisanship can be acquired as a result of the person growing up in a family with strong affiliation and attachment to a specific party or by the beliefs which were influenced by the peers or the individual was able to get own opinion on the political divide.

The content of the current partisanship in US is permeated with the antagonism towards the persons of opposing party. The emotions play a significant role in the antagonistic partisanship.  “The anger and anxiety fueled nature of contemporary American politics has dramatic implications, many of which have been identified by political psychologists working in the field of emotion and politics. Recent work has shown that Americans tend to dehumanize supporters of the opposing party”.

The partisanship dehumanization in US reached the levels when the use of violence against the members of the confronting party is considered acceptable. “Political psychologists have begun to demonstrate that Americans do not share an equal concern when others suffer. On the contrary, a growing body of work suggests that Americans enjoy seeing political ‘others’ suffer”.

The second assassination attack against former President Trump in the last two months asks for a question what is the cause of the extreme hatred towards the candidate for the President?

As it was noted in the previous paragraphs the partisanship dehumanization and polarization, which may lead to violence, is a part of the political scene in the United States of America. The motivation of both assassinations is still under investigation but what we can say with certainty it was not the love of Mr. Trump that cause the assailants to do what they did it was the extreme hatred of the man. What is the origin of this hatred?

Close to a decade the Democratic party and the mass media were attacking continuously the former president with the accusations depicting Mr. Trump as an authoritarian dictator who will destroy the democracy in US. The senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller in the posting on the social platform X was asking the current Vice President a question, “Why hasn’t Kamala told her supporters yet that Trump is not a threat to democracy, is not a dictator, and condemned her party’s relentless demonization of Republicans as ‘Nazis’ who must be stopped”. The same article provides the findings of John Murthy, a professor at the University of Illinois who specializes in political rhetoric. He stated that the frustration experienced by the Republicans is justified “that not enough attention is being paid to these attacks”, referring to two assassinations attempts of the former president. The professor had also detected a new trend in Kamala Harris’s campaign strategy:” Her strategy has been to diminish him through laughter. Using humor to make him into somebody small. That’s continually been the effort”. Ms. Harris emphasizes in her speeches that it is time to turn the page on an era of divisiveness and thus presenting herself as a conciliator and peacemaker. The above shows Kamala Harris have skillful, cunny, scheming and hypocritical advisors. The socialist Bernie Sanders, during the interview on the NBC program ‘Meet the Press’, told Ms. Harris had change her extreme leftist positions to the moderate center ones to win the presidency, but her Marxist values stay with her.

Trump response to the calls of support from Joe Biden and Kamala Harris after second assassination attempt shows that he was sincerely touched. “He (meaning Biden) was so nice to me yesterday. In one way I sort of wish that call hadn’t been made because I do feel a little-He’s so nice. Same with Kamala today. She could not have been nicer”. We hope Mr. Trump did not take the statements of Janus, double-faced political charlatans to heart.

Couple minutes ago, I finished to watch on TV Trump’s rally at Uniondale, NY, a hamlet in central Nassau County, New York on Long Island. Using his unique upbeat manner of speaking the truth Trump delivered a message of hope and optimism.  “I’m not a threat to democracy they are” referring to the corrupt anti-American policies of opposing party’s presidential candidate.