Trump called the midterm results a “tremendoussuccess.” ­Republicans clearly felt the sting anyway. In January, whenRepresentative Steve King set his career on fire by questioning how terms like“white nationalist” and “white supremacist” had ­“become ­offensive,” GOPleaders quickly condemned his comments. Their action was remarkable, given thatthey had mostly ignored the Iowa congressman’s extensive record of raciststatements and dubious associations for more than a decade; just last year, heendorsed a Canadian politician with neo-Nazi ties.

川普称中期选举结果是“巨大的成功”。——共和党人显然感到了刺痛。今年1月，当众议员史蒂夫·金质疑“白人民族主义者”和“白人至上主义者”等词汇如何“变得具有攻击性”，点燃了他的政治生涯之火时，共和党领导人迅速谴责了他的言论。他们的行动是引人注目的，因为十多年来，他们基本上忽视了爱荷华州国会议员关于种族主义言论和可疑关联的大量记录；就在去年，他还支持了一位与新纳粹主义有联系的加拿大政治家。

The moral authority fell to Senator Tim Scott ofSouth Carolina, the GOP’s lone black member in the Senate. “Some in our partywonder why Republicans are constantly accused of racism,” he wrote in TheWashington Post. “It is because of our silence when things like this are said.”

道德权威落在南卡罗来纳州参议员蒂姆斯科特身上，他是共和党在参议院中唯一的黑人议员。“我们党内的一些人想知道为什么共和党人总是被指责为种族主义，”他在《华盛顿邮报》上撰文道。“正是因为我们的沉默才说出了这样的话。”

So diversity is the winner, right? Not so fast.

多样性是赢家，对吧？没有那么快。

For all the talk about the Democratic rout, therewas no clear message from the midterms. Yes, the new House is historically­female and diverse. But in eight white working-class House districts inMinnesota, Pennsylvania and Michigan, where Democrats flipped seats away fromRepublicans, the winners were all white. Haley Stevens, who worked in the Obamaadministration on rescuing the auto industry and finding jobs for laid-offworkers, took Michigan’s 11th from Republicans after half a century. But shesoon distanced herself from her progressive colleagues in February, after she wasasked about what one voter saw as the anti-Semitism of her pro-Palestinianfellow freshman classmates.

Michigan’s 11th and the other seven flippedMidwestern districts are precisely the sort of places Democrats will want toclaw back from Trump in 2020. But Democrats now must decide whether they shouldeither write off the white identifiers who hearkened to Trump’s racialmessaging, or try to win some of them over, as Obama did. Those who thinkDemocrats don’t need them look to the rapidly changing populations of stateslike Arizona, Georgia and Texas. Others see a basic math problem: As much asthe country is changing, white working-class voters will still make up nearlyhalf of the electorate in 2020. And they are concentrated in the Midwesternstates long considered key to Democratic success.

All this has led to a mostly hushed conversationamong Democrats about race and who they should nominate from a crowded anddiverse primary field. “I think it better be a white male,” said MichaelAvenatti, the fleeting White House hopeful and pugnacious lawyer for adult filmactress Stormy Daniels in an interview with Time last year. “And I don’t saythat because I want it to have to be a white male. I say that because of therealities of the situation. If the Democrats nominate anyone other than a whitemale at the top of the ticket, they’re gonna lose the election. I’d be willingto bet anything.”

Why? “It’s different when you have a white malemaking the arguments. They carry more weight,” he said. “Should they carry moreweight? Absolutely not. But do they? Yes.”

Avenatti soon bowed out of the race after adomestic violence allegation (he denied it and was not charged by prosecutors),but Senator Bernie Sanders struck a similar chord after the midterms, sayingthat voters in Florida and Georgia grew uneasy with black Democratic candidatesfor governor amid the race-baiting attacks from their GOP opponents. “There area lot of white folks out there who are not necessarily racist who feltuncomfortable for the first time in their lives about whether or not theywanted to vote for an African-American,” he told The Daily Beast.

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