A recent NBC News poll affirms the unpopularity of President Donald Trump and his brainchild, the fascistic MAGA movement.
A scant 24% of respondents viewed the traffic-cone-colored demagogue's movement favorably, while nearly twice as many, 45%, expressed their distaste for the antidemocratic ideology.
For Biden and his Democratic cohorts, MAGA has become shorthand for fervent, pro-Trump cultists who cling to the former president's extremist rhetoric like barnacles to a sinking oligarch's yacht —including the baseless conspiracy that the 2020 election was filched from their leader.
Among Republicans, a modest majority of 52% hold a favorable view of the MAGA movement. However, the movement faces a harsher reception among the unaffiliated, with a mere 12% of independents giving it their blessing.
The MAGA movement finds solace in the embrace of its core constituency—white, less-educated, rural Americans. Rural dwellers, the highest-ranked geographic subgroup, offer the most robust support, with just over a third viewing the movement positively.
Why does MAGA persist? Blame it on the underpinnings of a political system riddled with chicanery and imbalance. Voter suppression and the dark arts of gerrymandering work hand-in-glove to dilute the majority party's power, while the anachronistic Electoral College skews representation in favor of the few. A corrupt Supreme Court further tips the scales for Christian nationalists, and an inequitable legislative framework grants two senators to both Democratic California (pop. 39 million) and Republican Wyoming (pop. 575 thousand). Despite almost everyone hating it, the MAGA movement endures, fueled by the very mechanisms that threaten the integrity of democracy itself.
