Opinion editor explains how political, media elites are 'deplatforming' working class in new book
Newsweek opinion editor Batya Ungar-Sargon claims there is not really a right-left divide in this country, but a split between the working class and the political and media elites.
Journalist Batya Ungar-Sargon claims there is not really a right-left divide in this country, but a split between the working class and the political and media elites, who have effectively "deplatformed" normal working Americans to cater to their college-educated base.
The Newsweek opinion editor described this actual alignment in America to Fox News Digital, which is the subject of her new book, "Second Class: How the Elites Betrayed America's Working Men and Women."
In the book, Ungar-Sargon details her conversations with working-class Americans all over the country, who provide her with insights into how the country is really divided, how everyday Americans view politics, and whether they still believe in the American dream.
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Newsweek opinion editor Batya Ungar-Sargon tells Fox News Digital about her new book, "Second Class: How the Elites Betrayed Americas Working Men and Women." (Fox News )
"I interviewed many, many people from all different backgrounds and persuasions and races and religions and industries to get, a very robust sense of who is the American working class," Ungar-Sargon told Fox News.
"And those are the stories that you'll find in ‘Second Class,’ as well as the ways in which the elites have betrayed them from a policy point of view, and how we can help these people in their own words."
She found that working class Americans aren’t actually as divided as the politicians and the media would have us believe, telling Fox that "all of the polling and my own interviews suggest that there's actually a lot of consensus in America… especially among the American working class, about what ideologies and what views and what policy agenda would help them."
"But that is not reflected in our political life or even the media," she added, pointing out that the political division really only exists among the elites, which is why working-class Americans "cannot get their needs met" nor have their "voices heard" by people in positions of power.
The author explained that the elite class, especially those belonging to the Democratic Party, cater to fellow elites with their policies and agendas. She said, "most of our politicians are college-educated. The vast, vast majority of our media is culled from not only the college-educated, but people with elite degrees and multiple degrees. And of course, that's not representative of America at all."
She continued: "Their base is the college-educated elites who have student loans, who are the consumers of illegal labor and who are not struggling to pay grocery bills, which leaves them a lot of time to worry about the climate and love to drive, you know, little Chinese made electric vehicles the six blocks from their home in Brooklyn to the Whole Foods and back."
Ungar-Sargon noted this results in the "plunder of the middle class," going on to say that working class peoples’ "lives are increasingly difficult and precarious thanks to Democratic policies that are geared towards rewarding a college education. And we never hear from these people, even though they're the majority of Americans."
They have "effectively been deplatformed," she declared.
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Despite what audiences may see in the mainstream media, working-class Americans – which the author says make up two-thirds of the country – are "extremely united in terms of what they consider to be the policy agenda they would want."
She gave multiple examples, starting with the fact that "they're very supportive of gay people having access to marriage and a stable life and finding love, being able to raise children. But they're very worried about the transgender agenda, which they think is extremely dangerous for children."
The author also noted that most of the country wants the government to be "raising taxes on corporations but not expanding the welfare state."
They also support "a total moratorium on immigration for the foreseeable future, and some kind of catastrophic government-backed health care, so people don't go into medical debt."
Ungar-Sargon claimed that this explains why neither political party has a firm hold on the working class, stating that each one "has a piece of the agenda, but is actively undermining the other piece of it."
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Despite proclaiming that neither the GOP nor the Democratic Party truly adopt working Americans’ political agenda, Ungar-Sargon said that "a lot" of the working class feel that presumptive GOP nominee former President Trump, "is a good choice" because he is a "moderate candidate."
"There is a moderate in this race and his name is Donald Trump. If you look at the policies that he has laid out, where he is at, it is very close to where the working-class people who I interviewed are at on both sides of the aisle."
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