I would argue that racists wouldn't vote for a person of color. Unless if you go by the 2020 definition of racist, which is basically a buzz word used by angry leftists and Twitter activists who can't think of any legitimate criticism for their political opponents.
If you go by the swing map, this really reinforces my idea. What I would argue is the most racist state of the union, Arkansas, swung hardest against Obama. White voters in West Virginia, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Louisiana also swung hard R. These Deep South and Appalachian states have a pretty long history with racism against African Americans.
These swings/trends would be much more notable if they were isolated to 2008/12, but states like Arkansas and Tennessee have trended *very consistently* toward the GOP for decades. Your point would be better made if these states resumed a "normal" level of support for Democrats after Obama left office but that hasn't happened. Arkansas even swung towards Trump in 2020, meaning it has swung to the Republican in every election since 1992.
You make good points overall, but really, the 2020 result was I think the case of WWC Obama voters who reluctantly backed Clinton over Trump because muh Bill, but in 2020 they reverted to Trump. If you notice, every single county in the state barring the urban/suburban ones shifted decisively rightward. Rural counties in states like LA and TN did shift rightward but not nearly to the degree AR's did, which is why I do think it had something to do with Clinton, even if she lost AR in a landslide and underperformed Obama.
