Aristopopulists like JD Vance can offer only empty promises to the working class | Kenan Malik

Trump's running mate was raised in poverty but he is typical of a new wave of elite politicians

The tragedy of Trump's candidacy is that, embedded in his furious exhortations against Muslims and Mexicans and trade deals gone awryis a message that America's white poor don't need: that everything wrong in your life is someone else's fault."

That was JD Vance, Donald Trump's pick for vice-president, writing on the eve of the 2016 presidential election about the manwho is now his boss. Trump, Vance wrote in another essay, serves up cultural heroin", his promises theneedle in America's collective vein", providing an easy escape from the pain". Voters would eventually have to trade the quick high of Make America Great Again' for real medicine".

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