In describing Republicans as “weird” during an MSNBC interview last month, Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz went viral, raising his national profile just as Kamala Harris was mulling over the selection of her running mate — and gifting Democrats with a smart new line of attack.

The insult is less disparaging than Hillary Clinton’s infamous “basket of deplorables” comment in 2016, more effective than the recently shuttered Biden campaign’s threat-to-democracy messaging, and, above all else, accurate.

If “weird” is to be understood as unpopular or outside of the mainstream, then much of the GOP’s socially conservative agenda is indeed weird. Or at least unexpected.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. Recent polling from the Manhattan Institute suggests that while most voters support left-leaning policy prescriptions on abortion and gun control, clear majorities oppose racial preferences, are pro tough-on-crime policing and prosecution and exhibit intense skepticism toward sex-based medical procedures for minors.

The GOP’s opportunity is obvious. The party need not run away from the culture war, but it must choose its battles wisely.

To be less weird — and to win more votes— Republicans ought to shift their emphasis away from legacy social issues and toward newer and more current cultural debates.

Survey data from last month suggest that Americans of all colors and creeds largely reject the activist racialism that crested in 2020.

More than two-thirds of Americans want a “colorblind” society, while less than a quarter prefer a “race-conscious” one.

Since the riots following George Floyd’s 2020 death in Minnesota and Mr. Walz’s anemic response as governor, dozens of states have adopted widely popular measures to regulate Critical Race Theory in schools and implement curriculum transparency requirements.

Efforts to abolish DEI bureaucracies and police illegal race-conscious policies at public universities have also grown more popular in the wake of the Supreme Court’s 2023 decision gutting affirmative action.

There is widespread public opposition to established racial-preference schemes and support for ending such favoritism in government contracting programs.

At the same time, the appetite for soft-on-crime policies has diminished significantly.

Scarred from COVID-era crime increases and highly concerned about illegal immigration, Americans want to see policy makers take more aggressive action on public-safety measures.

Most voters — including pluralities of black and Democratic voters — say our criminal justice system is “not tough enough.”

Majorities also support police clearing illegal public encampments set up by homeless people, along with the removal of aggressive campus protestors.

They also want bans on masks and other facial coverings in public.

Cultural conservatives have the upper hand on transgender issues too.

Independents, black and Latino voters consistently tell pollsters that important, life-changing decisions about gender are being made too early in a child’s life.

An overwhelming majority of Americans, including a plurality of Democrats, believe that children who identify as transgender should not be allowed to receive medical treatments and move toward transitioning before the age of 18.

The same is true of “social transitions”: most voters and a sizable plurality of Democrats disagree with a new California law permitting educators to conceal from parents that their child wants to switch names or gender pronouns at school.

Americans hold traditionalist instincts even on emerging issues whose policy contours are so far undefined.

For instance, voters express high levels of concern over the use of cellphones in schools by children and teens.

Center-left social psychologist Jonathan Haidt highlighted this problem in his recently released book, “The Anxious Generation”; Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin was the first in the nation to issue an executive order on cellphone-free education in K-12 public schools.

Even as Democrats like Mr. Walz tar Donald Trump as weird, there is evidence that the former president wishes to normalize the GOP.

He has pushed for a transition away from an older, unpopular social conservatism and toward a newer, popular cultural conservatism.

Consider the 2024 GOP platform, which Mr. Trump reportedly crafted himself. The presidential nominee scrapped any condemnation of gay marriage, instead celebrating the sanctity of marriage more generally.

He altered pro-life language to focus opposition on late-term abortions, remove calls for a federal ban (which Mr. Trump says he opposes) and lend support to “policies that advance Prenatal Care, access to Birth Control, and IVF (fertility treatments).”

Yet, following Mr. Trump’s rewrite, the platform still embraces confrontational policies on cultural issues where the party’s position is reflective of public sentiment.

It excoriates “Leftwing propaganda” on gender, sexuality and race; promises to “defund schools that engage in inappropriate political indoctrination”; and harshly condemns illegal immigration and violent crime.

Republicans find themselves at a moment of profound opportunity, but also a crossroads.

Changes in America — from the progressive left’s growing societal influence to the originalist right’s victories at the Supreme Court — have yielded an electorate that views yesterday’s social conservatism as weird, but today’s cultural conservatism as sensible.

The question is whether the party can realize it, make the necessary adjustments to capitalize, and prove Mr. Walz wrong in November.

Jesse Arm is the Director of External Affairs & Presidential Initiatives at The Manhattan Institute