Pew: Obama’s true legacy is divided nation, bad race relations

'Stark partisan fissures are likely to persist and may deepen'

Barack Obama leaves the presidency with the nation more divided than at any time in decades, race relations at a new low and a surge in atheism, according to a new survey by Pew Research.

The survey concludes the United States is “undeniably different” than when Obama was elected eight years ago, citing such trivia as the introduction of the Apple iPhone during his 2007 campaign and the fact that Twitter was only two years old then.

But things haven’t gone so well on other issues.

“The election of the nation’s first black president raised hopes that race relations in the U.S. would improve, especially among black voters,” Pew said. “But by 2016, following a spate of high-profile deaths of black Americans during encounters with police and protests by the Black Lives Matter movement and other groups, many Americans – especially blacks – described race relations as generally bad.”

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