Appearing as a guest on Tuesday's CBS This Morning, Yahoo News political columnist Matt Bai brought up 1960s era segregationist Alabama Democratic governor and former presidential candidate George Wallace during a discussion of Donald Trump's popularity. Host Norah O'Donnell raised President Barack Obama accusing Trump of "exploiting the fears of blue-collar men" as she posed:
Do you think it's interesting that the President addressed this yesterday in that NPR interview saying essentially that Donald Trump is exploiting the fears of blue-collar men in particular?
Bai began his response:
Yeah, I mean, that's, you know, the President has said this, I think the President feels the need to address it in a sense because it has been the dominant factor that we've talked about in the race. And it's a population of the electorate that's been clearly strengthened.
The Yahoo News national political columnist lumped George Wallace in with "decades of conservative politics" as he added:
You know, this goes back for decades in conservative politics, decades in America. I covered Ross Perot. You remember that, Norah. I covered, you know, Jesse Ventura in Minnesota. There is a very dissatisfied conservative piece of the electorate, you know. It goes back really as far as George Wallace.
I think its been exceptionally activated, strengthened, and intensified by the Trump campaign because he speaks to that part of the electorate and manipulates those emotions in a way very few professional politicians or officeholders in the last couple of decades have been willing to do.
