Published on November 8, 2024 at 9:02 p.m. / Modified on November 8, 2024 at 9:26 p.m.
He is the most divisive of American presidents, yet Donald Trump has managed to convince very diverse sections of the population. While he was able to be virulent towards certain communities, these same communities preferred to vote for him than for Kamala Harris, last Tuesday, November 5. For what?
The female vote
With Trump’s anti-abortion positions, one could have estimated that the female vote would turn to Kamala Harris. If we compare the votes of voters, based on polls carried out at the end of the vote, the gap between the two presidential candidates is 10 points. 54% of women voted for Harris compared to 44% of men. This is the smallest margin won by Democrats in this category since 2004. How can we explain it? Opinions regarding abortion have evolved significantly among the American population in recent times. Several states also organized a vote on this theme on the same day as the presidential election. While 60% of citizens were in favor of it remaining “legal in most cases” in 2022, the latest polls showed a perfect division of the population (49-49) on abortion. These debates obviously did not play a significant role in favor of Kamala Harris.
The religion
Arab-Muslims historically vote for Democrats in the United States, but President Joe Biden’s support for Israel in the Gaza war weighed on Kamala Harris’ campaign. The vice-president was unable to distance herself from the positions of the current occupant of the White House and would therefore have lost part of this electorate, particularly in Dearborn in Michigan, the first city with an Arab majority in the country, where Trump beat her by 6 points (42 to 36).
Communities
Since Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump is the only candidate to have visited the Bronx, a neighborhood with a large African-American (30%) and Hispanic (55%) majority. It was May 23, and this opportunity allowed him to divert his trial in the classified documents affair. In the Bronx, he said: “It doesn’t matter if you’re black, brown, white or any other damn color, it doesn’t make any difference. We are all Americans.
Although only 12% of the black community ultimately voted for him, many personalities (Byron Donalds, member of the Black Conservative Federation (BCF), Azealia Banks, MIA, etc.) campaigned alongside him. Some male members of the black community, over-represented in the prison system, take a dim view of Kamala Harris’ past as a prosecutor and claim that she is not a “real” black person.
Many of them also turned to Trump because of the significant inflation under the Biden mandate. In his meetings, the billionaire regularly recalled the low unemployment rate of the black community during his presidency and accused migrants of stealing “black jobs”.
Donald Trump’s economic promises have also (and above all!) appealed to the Hispanic community, which is also on average younger, more working-class and less educated than the white population.
Kamala Harris certainly won 53% of the Hispanic vote against 45% for Trump, but this score for the Democrats is the lowest recorded in fifty years. This Hispanic social divide is described in detail on our site.
City versus countryside
While he won mainly in rural areas in the past, this time, Donald Trump’s gains are all the more important as the area is populated (including in the large suburbs). He gained +8.1 points on average in the urban center counties.
The undecided also rallied to the Republican at the end of the campaign, the winner surpassing Kamala Harris by 26 points in this category.
