Yearender: Americans drawn to political outsiders amid low point in trust for Washington

At a time when Americans hold a highly skeptical view of Washington, political outsiders are seeing their popularity surge.

Indeed, a sense of frustration with Washington's elite has been a boon to political outsiders in the 2016 race to the White House, especially Republican Party (GOP) front runner Donald Trump.

Many of Trump's supporters say they are tired of what they call de facto limits on free speech brought on by the nearly hysterical climate of political correctness that has overtaken many parts of the United States.

They are frustrated with a White House that, they contend, is not taking the lead in the fight against the Islamic State, and many are worried about another Islamist terror attack on the United States, such as the terror strike on San Bernardino, California, which killed more than a dozen innocent victims.

They fret over the economy, in which millions of Americans remain unemployed or underemployed several years after the recession, and they view Washington elites on both sides of the isle as making Champagne toasts while ordinary people struggle to get by.

"I think Americans are drawn to outsiders like Trump...because there is a widespread distrust of what is seen as the political establishment," Dan Mahaffee, an analyst with the Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress, told Xinhua.

"For a wide swath of Americans who are concerned by terrorism abroad, immigration to the United States, and an uncertain economic future, they see the traditional political leadership as unable to deal with these issues, and are drawn towards populist outsiders," he said.

Mahaffee said this is seen in American political history when there are times of concern or unease about events at home or abroad.

"But the vitriol coming from Trump is unprecedented, unless you go back to parties like the Know-Nothings and other more radical political groups in American history," he said.

In the wake of the brutal Islamist terror attacks on California and Paris that together left dozens dead, the GOP front-runner in recent days called for a ban on Muslim immigration to the United States.

The statement drew fire from several other Republican candidates, who said the plan was not a serious one and that the measure, if implemented, would amount to a draconian move that runs counter to American ideals.

Some pundits noted that such a move would hurt the fight against Islamist radicalism, as Washington needs moderate Muslim countries such as Egypt and Jordan to fight terror, and banning all Muslims from coming to the United States would make such countries very unhappy.

Clay Ramsay, research director at the Center on Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland, told Xinhua that there have been at least three kinds of "outsiders" in the last 70 years. The first group comprises people who came from outside of politics or civil service and had never run for any office successfully. Those include current GOP candidates such as Trump, retired surgeon Ben Carson and former CEO of Hewlett Packard Fiorina.

The second are politicians who surged up from one wing of a major party and briefly took over, such as George McGovern in the 1972 elections and Barry Goldwater in 1964.

And the third are people who had a career in government and then ran as third-party or independent candidates, such as John B. Anderson in 1980, George Wallace in 1968, Strom Thurmond in 1948, and Henry Wallace in 1948, he said.

Christopher Galdieri, assistant professor at Saint Anselm College, told Xinhua that the current popularity of outsiders is not unique in history.

"This sort of thing ebbs and flows. People don't generally flock toward outsiders when things are great. It's when things are bad that an outsider starts to look good," he said.

Going forward, Mahaffee said there will continue to be a powerful vein of the American public, particularly among the GOP base, that will gravitate towards outsiders. The sense that Washington is disconnected from the rest of America remains strong, and there is distrust of the political elite.

Additionally, as many see their path to economic opportunity disappearing as the global economy changes, there is a sense that the political establishment is unable or unwilling to address their concerns, he said. Endi