I’ve been saying for months now that this was going to happen and should happen when the general election rolls around in November:

The Bernie Sanders voters who would choose Trump over Clinton | US news | The Guardian https://t.co/o5nkhk2ENf pic.twitter.com/bnCqdtiorY — Hunter Wallace (@occdissent) March 17, 2016

I get it.

Believe me, I do. Within my own family, I don’t know anyone who supported Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz, but my brother and first cousin voted for Bernie Sanders. My father liked Trump and Sanders … he hates Wall Street with a passion, but voted for Trump because of Sanders position on guns. Sanders was MY second choice.

Why on earth would anyone like Trump and Sanders? It is because they share common ground on a lot of issues: free-trade, Iraq, Russia, veterans and campaign finance. Of the five major issues that Trump has been running on (free-trade, foreign policy, immigration, campaign finance and political correctness), Sanders has been running in the “populist lane” on three of them.

I know these people very well. The fact that Trump has been condemned by National Review for not being a “true conservative” is enticing to them. The fact that he isn’t a religious crank like Ted Cruz and is running a secular campaign makes him more attractive. The fact that Trump isn’t a puppet of the donor class who is doing the bidding of Goldman Sachs like Ted Cruz and Hillary Clinton is also attractive.

For lots of Sanders voters, a “true conservative” is someone like Mitt Romney who wants to cut taxes for rich people, ship jobs overseas, destroy labor unions, carry water for Wall Street, blow up foreign countries, and bring on the Rapture. They believe things like “White working class towns deserve to die” and Ted Cruz is the anointed one and the second coming of George Washington.

If you are a Sanders voter, I say to you: a lot of the “true conservatives” are bolting the Republican Party. We’re going to be losing the Erick Erickson/Glenn Beck crowd. We are losing the neocons who openly saying that they are supporting Hillary in the general election. We’re losing the free-traders who can never support an evil “protectionist” who doesn’t want to ship jobs overseas to China.

The Lesson of 2016: People Are The Worst https://t.co/OP11ty8pf3 pic.twitter.com/Fb6lU0kc1S — Hunter Wallace (@occdissent) March 17, 2016

Their careers should be drawn and quartered!

In my experience, there are two kinds of Sanders supporters. There are those who are White and not very religious, but who deeply believe that we are living in a “rigged economy,” that Wall Street has too much power, that Sanders is authentic and wants to restore the middle class and tackle income inequality and address student loan debt. These are people who would have never participated in the circus in Chicago.

OTOH, there are the true blue SJWs like our friend Tommy Dimassimo who charged the stage at the Trump rally in Chicago. These people were stunned when the blacks in state after state voted as a block in favor of Hillary Clinton. They are motivated more by identity issues though than economics. Most of them will sit out the general election or vote for Hillary because they could never vote for Trump.

The true blue SJWs are probably beyond redemption. Just the other night, I was closely watching the election in Missouri. As I ate some Chinese takeout, I told my wife who is from the St. Louis area that North County and St. Louis hadn’t fully reported, and that Bernie Sanders would probably lose Missouri to Hillary when the fraudulent returns from places like Jennings and Ferguson came in.

Think of all the SJWs who came from all across America to Ferguson to demonstrate for “racial justice.” They just don’t understand race. It must have stung when Ferguson came in for Hillary. Virtually everywhere outside of Michigan – and even there two-thirds of blacks voted for Hillary – the progressive movement has been stopped cold in its tracks because of the black block vote.

How do you reconcile your belief in white privilege with the reality of the power of the black vote which you have seen singlehandedly defeat Bernie Sanders in state after state? How can you deny the salience of race when you know Hillary is going to win Mississippi because of the racial demographics?

Anyway, maybe some of them will get it, particularly those too young to know better. Maybe a few of them have learned a lesson about race from this experience. As we move toward the general election, Trump would be wise to broaden his education platform to tackle student loan debt. He has a better chance of winning over lots of Sanders voters than the #NeverTrump cucks who voted for Cruz and Rubio.