Us Working-class White Voters

For the past 40 years, America's economy has raked blue-collar white men over the coals. It whittled their paychecks. It devalued the type of work they did best. It shuttered factories and mines and shops in their communities. New industries sprouted in cities where they didn't live, powered by workers with college degrees they didn't hold.

No Democratic presidential candidate has won Kentucky since 1980 except Hillary Clinton's husband Bill, but she is treating the state as an opportunity to appeal to a demographic that has consistently snubbed her: working-class white men.

For the past 40 years, America's economy has raked blue-collar white men over the coals. It whittled their paychecks. It devalued the type of work they did best. It shuttered factories and mines and shops in their communities. New industries sprouted in cities where they didn't live, powered by workers with college degrees they didn't hold.

No Democratic presidential candidate has won Kentucky since 1980 except Hillary Clinton's husband Bill, but she is treating the state as an opportunity to appeal to a demographic that has consistently snubbed her: working-class white men.