“The enemy of my enemy is my friend” has long been a well-known saying, but now, thanks to this interesting new paper in the American Political Science Review, it’s also political science. The authors investigate whether hostility to immigrants, particularly Muslims, has actually helped to generate support for L.G.B.T.+ rights among otherwise conservative nativist voters. They found that citizens “strategically liberalize” their stance on L.G.B.T.+ rights when they are told that people from an ethnic out-group — for example, Muslim immigrants in Europe — oppose such protections. (Here again, Trump is a useful exemplar: Although he embraced gay rights in the Pulse speech as a cudgel against Muslims, in practice his administration dismantled L.G.BT. protections, including rolling back rules against workplace discrimination and banning transgender people from the military.)

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Persons: Bethany Allen, Ebrahimian, Allen, smartly, “, ”, it’s, Donald Trump, Trump Organizations: Science Locations: Beijing, China, “ Beijing, Europe