https://arab.news/9kqp8
As the US election results wrap up, Donald Trump has won all seven battleground states — and thus a clear majority of the Electoral College votes necessary to win the presidency — and is likely to win a majority of the nationwide popular vote. He successfully maintained his core base of older white voters and white voters without a college degree, while also making gains with nearly every demographic group in the country.
Many left-wing and right-wing politicians and political commentators have long assumed that the country’s changing demographics — with growing numbers of nonwhite voters — would inevitably benefit the Democratic Party, which has strongly embraced the idea that racial, ethnic and cultural diversity is a fundamentally good thing. Trump’s 2024 win disproves that assumption.
In this year’s presidential election, many voting trends continued as expected. Trump won a majority a white voters, a majority of male voters and a majority of voters who do not have a college degree. Vice President Kamala Harris won a majority of Hispanic voters, Black voters, female voters and a majority of voters with a college degree.
However, although Harris won majorities among nonwhite voters, Trump made significant gains with those groups, cutting into the Democratic Party’s base, while Harris did not chip away at Trump’s base. These shifts were sufficient to give Trump a clear electoral victory and signal a national shift toward the Republican Party. “Of the counties with nearly complete results, more than 90 percent shifted in favor of former President Donald J. Trump in the 2024 presidential election,” according to a New York Times analysis.
Shifts among Hispanic voters are perhaps the most important to Trump’s victory and to shaping the future of US politics
Kerry Boyd Anderson
Shifts among Hispanic voters are perhaps the most important to Trump’s victory and to shaping the future of US politics. Many Democrats have long assumed that this growing constituency would continue to favor their party, but the Republican Party made significant gains among Hispanic voters. This year, Trump won much larger portions of Hispanic voters than he did in 2020 or 2016.
At least two factors help to explain why many — though not all — political observers overestimated Hispanic support for Democrats.
First, Hispanics form a very loose identity group and many people who supposedly belong to the Hispanic demographic do not identify with many other people in that group. Hispanic Americans form a very diverse group. For example, there are Puerto Ricans, Cuban Americans, Tejanos, Mexican Americans and many more, with significant cultural differences.
Hispanics also have a wide range of experiences in the US. Those who can vote must be US citizens, which suggests that most Hispanic voters were born in the country or emigrated to America legally (or received amnesty in 1986) and have lived there for many years. This group does not always identify or sympathize with more recent immigrants who have entered the country without legal permission.
Second, while recognizing the high level of diversity among Hispanics, there are some commonalities that offer advantages for Republicans. Hispanics tend to be religious and socially conservative — traits that align more with the Republican Party than the Democratic Party. Many are immigrants or the children and grandchildren of immigrants who came to the US in search of safety and economic opportunity, and the Republican Party traditionally portrays itself as the party of law and order and economic prosperity. For a demographic group that tends to be socially conservative, entrepreneurial and deeply desirous of safety and security, left-wing Democrats’ emphasis on social justice and equity is often unappealing.
A gender gap and concerns about immigration played a role. Hispanic men, in particular, shifted in favor of Trump, with more Hispanic men voting for Trump than Hispanic women. Also, a sense of insecurity at the US’ southern border — with very large numbers of undocumented migrants crossing the border — helped shift some Hispanic voters in those regions toward Trump.
Arab American voters also demonstrated their frustration with the Biden administration’s handling of the war in Gaza
Kerry Boyd Anderson
Black Americans have been a bastion of Democratic support since the civil rights movement and Harris easily won a majority of Black voters. However, Trump made notable gains with younger Black men. “Trump about doubled his share of young Black men” compared to the 2020 election, according to AP News.
Reporting among Black communities suggested that older Black voters, who experienced the civil rights movement, remain loyal to the Democratic Party, as do Black women. However, the same reporting found that younger Black men are increasingly questioning whether the Democratic Party has benefited them or cares about their concerns. To some extent, many young Black men appeared to doubt whether a woman could be a sufficiently strong president.
Arab American voters also demonstrated their frustration with the Biden administration’s handling of the war in Gaza at the polls. Initial results from areas with large Arab American and Muslim American communities in Michigan suggest that the Democrats lost thousands of votes compared to 2020, with more Arab Americans voting for Trump or third-party candidate Jill Stein than for Harris.
This shift is less likely to be durable than the changes among Hispanic and Black voters, as Trump is likely to pursue extremely pro-Israel policies and also won support from strongly pro-Israel voters. Nonetheless, the vote clearly demonstrated Arab American anger with Democrats.
Democrats will engage in much debate about why Trump won and they lost — and there will be many different explanations. Any useful explanation must take into account the reality that the current Democratic Party is losing its appeal among a diverse array of Americans.
- Kerry Boyd Anderson is a writer and political risk consultant with more than 18 years of experience as a professional analyst of international security issues and Middle East political and business risk. Her previous positions include deputy director for advisory with Oxford Analytica. X: @KBAresearch