In the first months of the gubernatorial race in Virginia, the eventual winner, Glenn Youngkin, trailed the Democrat, former Governor Terry McAuliffe, so decisively that Republican pundits started claiming voter fraud long before a vote was cast. In an act of political desperation, like clockwork, Youngkin leaned on what many candidates have done before him—a made-up Black boogie man to rile up voters. Instead of the Black Menace trope, the super-predator device, or the potential horrors of school busing, critical race theory (CRT) was the boogie man of choice used to stoke the Republican base and peel off white Democrats.
Trump didn’t invent racism; racism invented Trump and other elected hopefuls (brookings.edu)
