Would you guys date a Trump supporter? No. Absolutely not, sorry, no.
A recent study by the dating website Plenty of Fish shows that only 33% of women on the site are willing to date a Trump supporter. And male Trump supporters are almost twice as likely to be blocked than non-Trump supporters. I wanted to bridge the partisan dating divide so I went to the most polarizing place in America.
The Republican National Convention. The perfect place to put my matchmaking skills to the test. But finding a democratic woman who would want to date a Trump supporter turned out to be a little harder than I thought.
Would you ever date a Trump supporter? Probably not. I can't imagine dating a Trump supporter.
I think it would make me sad. Yeah I would go on a date with him and tell him don't support Donald Trump. To try and convince him not to vote for Donald Trump?
Have you ever gone on a date with a Trump supporter? Absolutely not. Would you go on a date with a Trump supporter?
Would you try it out? He would have to be really good looking. I'll tell you what.
Dean will pay for all the wine. Ok I'm in. -Wait, what?
So I stood outside Chipotle until I finally found Ryan. A young, 27 year-old Republican that was DTF. Down to fix the tax code.
Has supporting Donald Trump been good for your dating life or made it harder? We talk about Netflix and what TV shows we're watching, we don't talk about politics We should though, I should have more open-minded conversations on my dates Maybe that's why I'm single. Would you like to go on a date where you will have open-minded conversations about politics?
As long as she's cute, yes. Yes! So since we blew out budget on last minute plane tickets to Cleveland we invited them over to our Airbnb ordered Papa John's, and gave them a $7 bottle of wine.
Thanks Dean. The night started off fairly carefree. So what brought you to Cleveland?
Uh, the RNC. The RNC? So are you a republican?
I am not, I am not. Are you? Yeah.
Are you voting for Donald Trump? Yeah, probably. What about you?
Uh, I am voting not for Donald Trump. But then they started talking about politics. Do you feel like Donald Trump has a lot of foreign policy experience?
No it's not good, I'll be honest. I don't agree with the whole build the wall thing but it's a signal like we have to strengthen our borders. Do you hate immigrants?
No I like them, but I want immigrants to pay taxes if they're going to work here. Well a lot of them do already. I know.
How do you feel about a tax system? I feel like we should be on a flat tax. A flat tax?
I mean I, I think that You're not going to agree with this. I know I'm not. I can already tell.
You're like, I can tell by the way you're saying it. No, I think that, I mean and I can just speak for myself I would actually be fine if my taxes were raised if it meant that– You're such a Goody Two-Shoes. I'm just saying, would you really care?
Can I get a little bit more wine? Please. What do you think about Black Lives Matter?
I feel like there is a tension between the police force and African Americans and then there's a part of me that's just like I feel like the media just blows it up. Like, I feel like, I guarantee you there are cops that kill white people. No, there definitely are.
Here's my thing. Being a cop does not give you a license do to whatever you want. And if you're a cop, I have rights.
When a cop tells me to do something, I'm going to do it. And I have no, I have no problems with the cops. But how often are you interacting with cops?
I interact with them quite a bit. White men are not being stop and frisked on the street regularly, I'm sorry they're not. It's interesting that we're kind of politically and idealogically polar opposites but there are things that we agree on.
We touched ground on certain bases and I feel like I maybe stirred you in the right way on some. And it's not just Ryan and Bridget that are bad at predicting differences across political ideologies. Research shows that Americans think they're much more different than they actually are.
One study has gone so far as to suggest that liberals and conservatives while differing systematically in their moral world views are actually more similar in their moral judgements than anyone thinks. A study of over 18 million couples found that among married couples under 30 only 40% had partners in the same political party. Whereas when you look at couples over 80 that number jumps to over 71%.
And given that a growing margin of millennials don't identify with either party maybe political ideology won't be as important. So maybe we shouldn't be so afraid of dating outside of our political comfort zone. If this evening is any indicator maybe there's still hope for love in America.
I feel like we killed that. Good date. Good date.
I think, you know, we found some common ground when we could. I think he is smart. I never thought I would say a Trump supporter would be smart.
I would go on a second date with him. I would. Maybe if we talked less.
Maybe if we went to a movie. -Would you go on a second date? Yeah I would.
I would. As long as she said yes. That’s all!
If she didn’t, then no.
