Supporters of former President Donald Trump desire harsher punishment for a Chinese-American man who committed bank fraud compared to a white man who committed the same crime, according to new research published in the Journal of Experimental Criminology.
“One result we found especially surprising was that individuals who supported former President Trump were much more likely to support the use of deportation for punishing bank fraud when the individual convicted of the offense was Chinese-American,” said study co-author Michael Reisig.
But why study how the race of a white-collar criminal influences punitive attitudes among those with high levels of faith in Trump? “Our interest in this topic stems from three considerations,” explained study co-author Francis Cullen. “First, during the COVID-19 pandemic, instances of fraud were pervasive and exacted high financial costs.”
“Second, because the origins of COVID-19 were attributed to China, we wanted to explore whether Chinese-Americans who perpetrated fraud would receive harsher sanctions. Third, and perhaps most important, then-President Trump expressed animus toward people of color and stigmatized the pandemic as the ‘China Flu.’ Thus, a key interest was in seeing if those with a close allegiance or faith in Trump perceived fraud differently depending on whether the perpetrator was Chinese-American.”
The study authors used the research firm Prolific Academic to recruit a sample of 1,509 Americans aged 18 years and older. The participants read a brief story about a 41-year-old man who had fraudulently obtained more than $1 million after applying for federally insured loans to save his nonexistent business. The participants were randomly assigned to read different version of the story.
The white-collar criminal was either described as “Jeffrey Miller, a 41-year old white man” or “Jian Zhang, a 41-year old Chinese-American man.” He was also either described as having “no prior criminal record” or “a prior criminal record.” Finally, the bank fraudster was either accused of obtaining federal funding meant for businesses that were struggling because of COVID-19 or federal funding meant for businesses that were struggling because of bad credit.
The participants used a four-point scale to indicate “how wrong” and “how harmful to society” they believed the crime committed by the person was. They then indicated whether they believed the person should go to prison and, if so, for how long (from 1 to 30 years). The participants also reported whether they believed the person described in the scenario should lose their citizenship and be permanently removed from the United States.
“In general, the public sees fraud as wrong, harmful, and as meriting punishment, including a prison sentence,” Cullen told PsyPost. Ninety percent of the sample said the man should be imprisoned, and called for a prison sentence of 13.06 years on average.
Interestingly, the white-collar crime was perceived as less wrong when the person was described as a Chinese-American man compared to when the person was described as a white man. Overall, participants were also less punitive when the person was described as Chinese-American. “It is possible that being a ‘minority’ was seen as a disadvantage that lessened perceptions of culpability and deserved sanctions,” the researchers said.
But this was not the case among a subset of participants with a high level of faith in Trump.
“Most revealing, those with higher faith in Trump responded differently when the perpetrator was Chinese-American, seeing the fraud as more serious and favoring harsher criminal sanctions,” Cullen said. “These respondents even favored deporting Chinese-American offenders despite their having U.S. citizenship. These results show the potential influence that Donald Trump has over his followers in their public attitudes toward crime and people of color.”
Participants were considered to have a high level of faith in Trump if they agreed with statements such as “Former President Trump is the only politician who really cares about the common man” and “I love former President Trump’s style because he is strong and tells it like it is.”
The researchers also found that participants viewed the fraud as more harmful after being told that the perpetrator had a criminal history.
However, whether the person was described as defrauding a COVID-19 program or a program for businesses with bad credit didn’t appear to influence the perceived wrongfulness or harmfulness of the act. “White-collar crimes that defrauded COVID-19 relief funds were not perceived more harshly than traditional forms of bank fraud. This was surprising considering that COVID-19 has been so much a part of Americans’ lives for the past two years,” said co-author Kristy Holtfreter.
The researchers controlled for factors such as political ideology, party affiliation, socioeconomic status, and demographic characteristics. But as with any study, the new research includes some caveats.
“This study focused on bank fraud, a specific form of white-collar crime. Whether Trump supporters in particular or most Americans in general hold similar views toward perpetrators of violent crimes remains unknown. Similarly, it is not known how public opinion might change if the perpetrator is female or a member of another minority group,” Holtfreter said.
“Future research should also examine what promotes faith in Trump and if these factors have an independent effect on public opinion. One promising line of research is focusing on white nationalism, the belief that the United States should remain white demographically and culturally,” added Cullen.
The study, “Faith in Trump and the willingness to punish white-collar crime: Chinese Americans as an out-group“, was published August 12, 2022.
