President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet selections are a mix of conventional (Senator Marco Rubio and Gov. Doug Burgum) and oddball (Tulsi Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.) — reflecting the heterodox coalition that brought him back to power.
While never a traditional Republican, Mr. Trump, in a second term, looks likely to go further than in his first in dumping many traditional Republican policies. In particular, Mr. Trump seems willing, even eager, to embrace vice.
In his recent campaign, Mr. Trump embraced a strategy of social moderation. Not only did he loudly signal his opposition to hard-line anti-abortion policies, but he also endorsed marijuana legalization in Florida and was aligned with the Biden administration’s move to give pot a less restrictive legal status. And he embraced the crypto craze, launching his own cryptocurrency company.
Mr. Trump’s moderation on pot, crypto — which some social conservatives see as closer to gambling than a serious investment — and other vices appears to have been part of a calculated effort to turn out young men who, surveys suggest, helped propel him to victory.
Pushing forward with liberalization in these areas could help establish “vice voters” as part of the new, post-Trump Republican coalition.
But it would also have dangerous social consequences — consequences that could help fuel an already growing backlash against both Mr. Trump and addictive, harmful goods of all kinds.
Mr. Trump’s cabinet picks indicate he could give these voters what they want. Take the issue of drugs. Mr. Kennedy, chosen to be the nation’s top health official, has supported federally legalizing marijuana. So has Matt Gaetz, Mr. Trump’s first, failed pick to be attorney general — and even with Mr. Gaetz’s name withdrawn, it signaled something striking, given that the attorney general can, after consulting with the health and human services secretary, reclassify controlled substances.
Mr. Gaetz has also expressed support for relaxing regulations on sports gambling. Ms. Gabbard has said that she wants to decriminalize all drugs, though that’s less relevant to her designated role in the new administration as director of national intelligence. Howard Lutnick, proposed to head the Commerce Department, is also a crypto fan.
Mr. Trump himself is no stranger to vice. But he most likely played it up in the campaign in large part because young men became in 2024 an unexpected swing constituency. Historically a left-leaning group, they appear to have been swayed at least in part by Mr. Trump for his perceived machismo and repelled by what some saw as scolding feminism in the Democratic Party.
But most important, young men are disproportionately more likely to be consumers of the many legal or semi-legal vices that have exploded over the past decade. The vast majority of both crypto owners and sports bettors are male. Men are more likely than women to smoke marijuana and cigarettes. These habits are common: In 2022, an estimated 17.7 million Americans used marijuana daily or near-daily, and the sports gambling and crypto markets have expanded. It makes sense that some of these consumers would vote based on their habits.
Not only Mr. Trump but also Vice President Kamala Harris seemed to believe in the existence of the vice voter. When Ms. Harris proclaimed an “opportunity agenda” for Black men, it included protecting crypto assets and getting them jobs in a legal marijuana industry. In the waning days of the election, her campaign placed ads on sports betting and video game websites.
That Mr. Trump appears to have won many of these voters cements an important part of the broader political realignment. Once the proud party of the Moral Majority and “just say no,” the G.O.P. is now also trying to be the party of gamblers and gamers — of what the writer (and Times Opinion contributing writer) Matthew Walther, thinking of a popular sports website, labeled the “Barstool conservatives.” This awkward coalition is reflected in a cabinet that combines Mr. Kennedy with Vice President-elect JD Vance, a staunch opponent of marijuana. And it may well be reflected in how the Trump administration treats vice.
This coalition is being shaped, though, just as the national mood on vice has started to sour. Amid rising reports of dangerous side effects, a majority of Americans now say pot is harmful to most of its users and society. Legalization efforts failed in three states, including Florida, on Election Day. Voters in Massachusetts resoundingly defeated a psychedelics liberalization initiative there. Sports gambling legalization in Missouri is on a knife’s edge as a thin margin could send it to a recount. And this year, Oregon ended its controversial drug decriminalization policy.
At the moment the Republican Party is embracing vice voters, Americans might be starting to understand the argument social reformers have long made: Vice is bad for society. An emerging body of research suggests that recreational marijuana legalization could cause enormous harms: worse academic performance, more fatal car accidents, more homelessness, more hospitalization. Crypto speculation has cost everyday Americans millions. Sports gambling legalization has been linked to increased rates of bankruptcy and ruined credit — particularly among young men.
Nothing about this is surprising. Pot and gambling are addictive. A subset of users will use them compulsively, in spite of harm to themselves or others. Combine that quality with the free market, and you get addiction for profit, as big businesses not only make money off hooked consumers but also encourage them to do more of the thing that’s hurting themselves and others. Legal vice doesn’t just let people do what they want; it also creates new industries — like Big Tobacco did in decades past — to sell them things that are bad for them.
If anything, the incorporation of vice voters into the Trump coalition could help accelerate the still-nascent backlash. Democrats, historically the party more sympathetic to personal license, might look with fresh eyes at the public health harms of vice industries. Republican courting of the vice voters might yield liberalization in the short run, but in the longer term, negative polarization could turn once-sympathetic opponents hostile.
A decade ago, no one would have guessed that a Republican president might be the one to legalize marijuana. Donald Trump, though, might just get it done. That would have profoundly negative consequences for public health. But it would also confirm a political shift that could, eventually, see the nation finally turn back against vice.
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