With a population of 335 million people, an economy and military power, the United States is one of the world's leading states. This large population is a synthesis of peoples from various countries. Turks are also a part of the American mosaic with their number reaching 220 thousand and increasing every year. Many Turks living in the US went to the polls to have their say in their country. How many of them voted for Kamala Harris, the Democratic candidate, and how many voted for Donald Trump, the Republican candidate, is difficult to predict at the moment. It is inevitable that communities like the Turks, whose history in the US is more recent than that of some other nationalities, will be closer to Kamala Harris due to her pro-immigrant stance.
\nHowever, according to allegations on social media, many Turks living in the US also voted for Trump, who appears to have more nationalist views.<\/p>\n
So, what influenced Turks' preference for Trump?
\nHistorian Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ayfer Karakaya Stump from the Department of History at the University of William and Mary in the US gave the reasons for this, which are discussed both in private conversations and in communication groups among Turks living there.
\nAccording to Stump, the following reasons seem to have influenced the choice of Turks who supported Trump<\/p>\n
- There are very few white-collar workers among Turks living in the US. They are usually small business owners or workers in businesses. Problems affecting businesses naturally affect Turks as well. The fact that Republicans support small business owners more is among the first reasons for the support.<\/p>\n
- Trump is very good at self-promotion. Everyone in the country, good and bad, and of course the Turks, are getting to know Trump more and more.<\/p>\n
- Some of the Turks who came to the US as immigrants and adopted this country are also sympathetic to the stronger candidate and are influenced by these discourses in order to keep America strong.<\/p>\n
- The conflicts in Ukraine and Palestine happened under Biden. Biden's poor management of the process in these countries also caused a reaction.<\/p>\n
- The fact that the expectations of Turks were not met under the Democrats' rule is also a factor. Especially the lack of visa facilitation is criticized. The fact that they did not open up as expected prevented them from appearing more sympathetic.<\/p>\n
- The fact that Turks also come from a patriarchal tradition has led some of them to be influenced by Trump, who uses more traditional and conservative rhetoric.<\/p>\n
- Since serving in the US Army is one of the most important ways to obtain citizenship in this country, many Turks are also taking this option. The belief, especially among soldiers, that they will be more comfortable under Trump may have influenced the Turks already serving in the military.<\/p>\n
- Even though Trump says, \u201cI will send illegal immigrants back,\u201d the fact that he did not send anyone back during his first term as president makes his anti-immigrant policies less of a deterrent. The prevailing view is that this is a tactic to attract the far right to the polls.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The fact that Republicans are more supportive of small businesses is just one of the factors in the Trump preference of Turks, most of whom are tradesmen or business employees.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":278683,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[15,78],"class_list":{"0":"post-278667","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-gundem","8":"tag-chp","9":"tag-kemal-kilicdaroglu"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=278667"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278667\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":278668,"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/278667\/revisions\/278668"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=278667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=278667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/halkweb.com.tr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=278667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}