In Pennsylvania, the handwringing and recriminations began virtually as quickly because the important 2024 battleground state was referred to as for Donald Trump.
How did Philadelphia, the Democratic bulwark, ship such an anemic margin for Kamala Harris? What explains the bellwether counties that Donald Trump wrested again after Joe Biden flipped them to the Democratic Celebration? And what occurred in rural Pennsylvania, the place the Harris marketing campaign made an effort to indicate the flag and but nonetheless misplaced 30 of the state’s 67 counties by greater than 40 factors?
It was a narrative that repeated itself throughout the electoral map, in swing states and non-competitive states alike. The Democratic coalition that delivered a convincing victory to Biden only a few years earlier merely disintegrated Tuesday, leaving the celebration surprised and disoriented over the scope of the destruction — and the GOP out of the blue invigorated.
Not all of the votes are counted but, however the structure of Trump’s victory is evident.
He managed to squeeze much more votes out of rural America — and that features positive factors with rural Black voters. He continued to make vital advances with Latino voters, from the Southwest to the Acela Hall. In massive, various city locations — like Houston’s Harris County or Chicago’s Cook dinner County — he pared down historically massive Democratic margins. Most of the populous suburbs that so totally rejected him in 2020 misplaced their anti-Trump edge. Even the largest faculty counties appeared to lose the sense of urgency and outrage that marked their 2020 outcomes.
And so, the Blue Wall crumbled, and the Solar Belt vanished for Democrats. Trump is at present on observe to brush the seven swing states and win a victory within the standard vote.
Listed here are the locations that designate what occurred.
Southeast Michigan
Vote-rich metro Detroit doomed Trump’s possibilities of profitable Michigan in 2020. This yr was a distinct story.
4 years in the past, Detroit’s Wayne County and suburban Oakland County buried Trump, notably as Oakland County turnout surged to 75 %. This time round, Oakland’s turnout was down barely and Harris pulled 112,000 fewer votes than Biden out of the state’s two most populous counties.
Oakland had been a high performer for Nikki Haley within the Republican major — she gained one-third of the vote in opposition to Trump — which made it a pure setting for one of many three Harris-Liz Cheney city halls. But that did not make a giant distinction as Trump improved on his efficiency there over 2020.
Closely Democratic Wayne County noticed an excellent steeper drop-off, reflecting Muslim and Arab American anger towards the Biden administration’s continued assist for Israel’s army offensive in Gaza and Lebanon. Trump, who as soon as proposed banning immigration from Muslim nations, nonetheless cultivated the assist of native Arab and Muslim leaders, culminating in a 9-point shift towards the GOP there. His efficiency was inflated by considerably elevated assist in Dearborn, Dearborn Heights and Hamtramck — all of which have heavy concentrations of residents of Center Jap descent.
Northern Virginia
Joe Biden made vital positive factors in 2020 over Hillary Clinton’s already profitable efficiency in Northern Virginia. On Tuesday although, the area that’s dwelling to over a 3rd of the state’s inhabitants out of the blue hit the brakes and shifted to the precise. Harris’ efficiency dropped by 5 factors in suburban and exurban Loudoun and Prince William counties. In Fairfax County, the state’s inhabitants big throughout the Potomac River from D.C., Harris was down 4 factors. The end result was by no means unsure in any of these locations however the diminished margins helped make the state extra aggressive than in 2020. It’s one motive why Virginia may very well be referred to as for Biden at 7:36 pm — roughly a half-hour after the polls closed — and why it wasn’t referred to as for Harris till 11:42 pm this yr.
South Texas
It was one of many largest tales of the 2020 presidential election: Trump’s sudden energy within the predominantly Latino Rio Grande Valley. Again then, he flipped only one county. This yr, Trump painted your complete border crimson — from the RGV all the best way north to Eagle Go’ Maverick County. Among the many counties Trump carried: Starr County, which is 97 % Hispanic and hasn’t voted Republican for president in over a century. Simply eight years in the past, Trump misplaced Starr to Hillary Clinton by a 79-19 % landslide.
Philadelphia and its suburbs
Upfront of Election Day, Philadelphia’s Democratic Celebration boss, former Rep. Bob Brady, laid out the yardsticks for achievement. If Harris wins a margin of over 500,000 votes in Philly, she’ll win, recreation over. But when she’s nearer to 450,000, “it’s going to be tight, that’s not going to be an early night time.”
Whereas there are nonetheless some votes to be counted, Harris’ margin of victory wasn’t even near that: simply 412,000. Evaluate that to Biden’s 2020 margin: 471,000 votes. There are many causes for the drop-off, however one among them stands out: Within the 114 majority-Latino precincts in Philadelphia, Trump’s share of the vote grew from 6.1 % in 2016 to 21.8 % in 2024, in response to a Philadelphia Inquirer evaluation.
The Philly numbers have been unhealthy sufficient — an enormous Democratic margin out of Pennsylvania’s largest metropolis is crucial to success for any Democratic marketing campaign. However they have been compounded by the Democratic fall-off within the big collar counties surrounding the town: Bucks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery. After enjoying a key function in sinking Trump’s probabilities in 2020, all of them shifted in his course by at the very least three factors; Trump even managed to flip Bucks County, marking the primary time it went crimson since 1988.
Central Florida
Trump’s thumping victory in Florida was embroidered with a lot of notable developments. None have been extra eye-catching than the leads to Orlando’s Orange County and neighboring Osceola County, that are dwelling to massive Puerto Rican communities. Regardless of the consternation surrounding the “island of rubbish” controversy, the 2 fast-growing counties lurched to the precise this yr. Osceola went as far as to flip to Trump — a 15-point shift from 2020. The consequence capped a shocking Trump-era evolution: In 2016, Osceola gave Hillary Clinton a commanding 60-36 % win. Eight years later, Trump carried the county.
Miami-Dade County
Florida noticed a handful of its main metro areas flip to Trump on Election Night time. Jacksonville’s Duval County and St. Petersburg’s Pinellas County, each of which voted narrowly for Trump in 2016 earlier than flipping to Biden in 2020, flipped again to the GOP fold. Tampa’s Hillsborough County made an excellent more durable proper flip — it voted for Trump after delivering a cushty 7-point win to Biden in 2020.
The larger story was Trump’s break-through in Miami-Dade County. Underneath Florida’s outdated political mannequin when it was an actual battleground, Democrats wanted to run up the rating in Miami-Dade to offset their losses elsewhere. Biden failed to try this in 2020, and it price him the state: The Trump administration’s shut consideration to Miami’s Cuban American neighborhood, and his marketing campaign’s anti-socialist and regulation and order messaging paid off, not simply amongst Cuban People however with Venezuelan People and different Latino teams.
Nonetheless, Biden managed to win Miami-Dade, even when it was by a diminished margin. This yr? Harris wasn’t even shut. Trump gained by 11 factors, representing the largest shift of any of the state’s 67 counties.
Southern Minnesota
The southern Minnesota Home district Tim Walz as soon as represented in Congress was brimming with so-called Pivot Counties, a set of roughly 200 counties throughout the nation that voted twice for Barack Obama earlier than flipping to Trump in 2016. They are usually whiter, much less prosperous, much less educated and smaller in inhabitants than the U.S. common and extra rural or small-town oriented.
Biden, who outperformed Hillary Clinton in a lot of rural and small-town America, was capable of win again three of southern Minnesota’s Pivot Counties — Blue Earth, Nicollet and Winona counties. A Democratic presidential ticket that includes Walz, who represented these areas first as their congressman after which as governor, may need appeared optimum within the battle to maintain these counties within the celebration fold. However even Walz’s presence on the poll did not show convincing to those voters, who determined to show again to Trump; the previous president dominated in Higher Minnesota — that’s, the areas outdoors the Democratic Twin Cities area.
McKinley County, New Mexico
The Trump marketing campaign’s low-key efforts to court docket Native American voters appeared to have paid dividends. Throughout the map, in historically Democratic, predominantly Native American counties, Trump made noticeable inroads. The 2 Montana counties that noticed the sharpest shifts to the precise have been Glacier and Blaine counties, each of which have Native American majorities. Robeson County in North Carolina, dwelling to the Lumbee tribe, noticed a 9-point shift to the precise — the largest crimson shift of any county within the state.
New Mexico’s McKinley County noticed an excellent greater motion towards Trump. Harris nonetheless gained comfortably, however the county, which is 81 % Native American and residential to members of a number of totally different tribes, shifted 14 factors to the precise.
All of this got here regardless of the Harris marketing campaign’s assiduous courting of the Native American vote. In late October, Walz campaigned in Window Rock, Arizona (the capital of the Navajo Nation authorities) — accompanied by Deb Haaland, the Inside secretary who’s Native American — the place he praised Native American army veterans and mentioned rural well being care. President Joe Biden additionally traveled in October to the outskirts of Phoenix, to the Gila River Indian Reservation, and formally apologized for the federal authorities’s function in operating boarding faculties the place 1000’s of Native American youngsters confronted mistreatment and compelled assimilation.
Regardless of the Democratic give attention to Arizona, which has the best proportion of Native People of the seven battleground states, Trump seems to be making sharp positive factors. With 60 % of the vote counted in Apache County (which is 72 % Native American), he’s operating far forward of his 2020 tempo.
Northeastern Pennsylvania
One massive query in Pennsylvania was how Harris would fare within the Republican-trending land of Biden’s beginning. Closely Catholic and white working class, demographically older, Scranton’s Lackawanna County and neighboring Luzerne County posed a major problem for Harris. Luzerne had already damaged laborious for Trump in 2016 and caught with him 4 years later; Biden’s 2020 margin in Lackawanna didn’t encourage confidence that it might stay within the Democratic fold, particularly with out him atop the ticket.
In the long run, Harris managed to narrowly maintain on to Lackawanna however with the identical barely diminished margins that doomed her elsewhere within the state. Luzerne, in the meantime, continued its rightward march, delivering its highest proportion but to Trump — 60 %.
Bristol County, Massachusetts
In presidential races, Massachusetts and Rhode Island present a number of the most reliably blue turf within the nation. However Bristol County, proper on the border between the 2 states, is just about lifeless even in the meanwhile — Harris leads Trump by lower than a proportion level. 4 years in the past, Biden simply gained there, 55-42.
What’s uncommon right here is that it’s been many years since any of Massachusetts’ 14 counties have voted for a Republican presidential candidate. Key to Trump’s enhanced efficiency within the cluster of cities and cities that make up Bristol County are New Bedford and Fall River. New Bedford, the place Trump’s assist spiked this yr, gives a glimpse into Trump’s non-traditional coalition — the town is roughly 1 / 4 Latino, with a comparatively sizable Puerto Rican inhabitants and a higher-than-average proportion of international born individuals. As well as, Trump flipped the town of Fall River, which like New Bedford has a comparatively low proportion of residents with faculty levels and a comparatively excessive proportion of foreign-born folks.
Johnson County, Iowa
Outsized margins by massive, liberal faculty counties have been a necessary component in Biden’s 2020 victory. However the identical diploma of anger and outrage towards Trump doesn’t seem like mirrored within the 2024 outcomes. Harris nonetheless gained all these locations, usually by very massive margins. However the margins are sometimes smaller than in 2020, or off a proportion level or two in county after county.
There are any variety of attainable causes — amongst them, the Gaza difficulty or Trump’s traction with younger male voters — however they gained’t be identified till all the outcomes are full and the voting knowledge is extra carefully scrutinized.
In Iowa Metropolis’s Johnson County (dwelling to the College of Iowa), there’s a 5-point shift towards Republicans. In Iowa State’s Story County, it’s 7 factors. The shifts have been barely smaller in Michigan State’s Ingham County and the College of Michigan’s Washtenaw County. It was the same story within the College of Georgia’s Clarke County, Penn State’s Centre County and the College of Florida’s Alachua County. Travis County, dwelling to the College of Texas and the state capital, delivered a Democratic margin this yr that was near 50,000 votes smaller than in 2020.
As for the College of Wisconsin’s politically super-charged Dane County, naturally it produced extra Democratic votes. However it was modest by its requirements — simply 7,200 votes greater than in 2020.
Jap North Carolina
The nation’s eyes have been mounted on Charlotte’s Mecklenburg County and Raleigh’s Wake County and the dimensions of the Harris margins they’d produce — and so they ended up underperforming relative to 2020. However the rural counties of jap North Carolina additionally performed a job in preserving Trump’s maintain on North Carolina. Trump made notable positive factors with Black voters throughout the area, flipping Nash County and almost flipping Wilson County. He additionally ran a number of factors forward of his 2020 tempo in majority Black Hertford and Northampton counties. It wasn’t sufficient to beat Harris in these counties, however it was a sign of the Democratic ticket’s weak spot with each rural white and Black voters.
It was a sample that repeated itself in southern Virginia and in South Georgia.
Milwaukee and its suburbs
Trump underperformed in Wisconsin’s so-called WOW counties (Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington), the normal Republican fortress surrounding Milwaukee, in each 2016 and 2020. With Waukesha and Ozaukee seemingly drifting leftward, the trio figured to be no match as a counterbalance to Madison’s Dane County and Milwaukee County this yr. But Trump cauterized the wound within the Republican suburbs and achieved one thing extra necessary — small and regular positive factors almost in every single place else within the state. It was a prosaic victory, not almost as sweeping or as eye-catching as in different states. However with Dane and Milwaukee counties acting at about the identical clip as in 2020, it was simply sufficient to win a state that was determined by an extremely small quantity of votes. With over 95 % of votes in, Trump was forward by lower than 30,000 votes.
Lehigh Valley
Easton’s Northampton County has an uncanny behavior of siding with the presidential winner and this yr was no totally different. It was one among three counties within the state to flip from Obama to Trump in 2016, after which it bounced again to Biden in 2020. This yr, it flipped again to Trump together with one other famous Pennsylvania bellwether, Erie County.
Neighboring Lehigh County additionally moved in Trump’s course, although not sufficient to offer Trump the win. What’s notable in each locations is that Trump advances got here in two counties with sizable Latino populations. His rising traction with Latino voters in Allentown, Bethlehem and Studying (which is simply outdoors the Lehigh Valley in close by Berks County) was apparent through the marketing campaign, however it was assumed the caustic remarks made at his late-campaign rally at Madison Sq. Backyard would show expensive given the appreciable Puerto Rican communities within the area.
Freeway billboards appeared in Allentown, Studying and Philadelphia that includes a photograph of a seaside in Puerto Rico with the message: “This isn’t rubbish and neither are we. Boricuas, this time, we vote for her.” However the election outcomes counsel the controversy didn’t transfer the dial very a lot in any respect.
