Election Recap | 10 Nov 24
News from the past week, and a few other things.
👋 Hello Reader,
I know it’s been a few weeks since I posted—it’s been a busy time for me, and frankly, there wasn’t much in the news to share. Well, you know, except for the U.S. election.
In that vein, here are some the more interesting articles I came across.
How Different Groups Voted in the 2024 Election (WSJ)
Here are the results of a survey of over 120,000 registered voters, compiled by the Associated Press, which offer a look at voting patterns and trends among various groups in the electorate and what issues were the most important to voters heading into Election Day.
NOTE: The article contains many, many other charts.
How battleground states shifted (AP)
From 2016 to 2020, most states moved toward the Democratic presidential candidate. That changed in 2024, when every state swung toward Republican Donald Trump.
US Presidential Election 2024 (FT)
How voters changed since the 2020 election.
Young Black and Latino men say they chose Trump because of the economy and jobs. Here’s how and why (AP)
Trump gained a larger share of Black and Latino voters than he did in 2020, when he lost to Democrat Joe Biden, and most notably among men under age 45, according to AP VoteCast, a nationwide survey of more than 120,000 voters. Even as Democrat Kamala Harris won majorities of Black and Latino voters, it wasn’t enough to give the vice president the White House, because of the gains Trump made. Voters overall cited the economy and jobs as the most important issue the country faced. That was true for Black and Hispanic voters as well. About 3 in 10 Black men under age 45 went for Trump, roughly double the share he got in 2020. Young Latinos, particularly young Latino men, also were more open to Trump than in 2020. Roughly half of young Latino men voted for Harris, compared with about 6 in 10 who went for Biden.
Democrats face a reckoning and a long rebuilding. There is no quick fix. (WP)
Defeat has launched a reckoning for Democrats. Ahead of Tuesday, many Democrats could not fathom that Trump could prevail, let alone win the popular vote, as he appears to be headed for while many ballots have yet to be counted. The search for answers has begun. Start with some fundamentals. This was a tough environment for the incumbent party. President Joe Biden’s approval rating on Election Day was 40 percent positive and 59 percent negative, according to network exit polls. Even in an era when politicians have uniformly low approval ratings, that 59 percent negative judgment was an anchor that weighted down Vice President Kamala Harris. On Election Day, 68 percent of voters said the economy was either “not so good” or “poor,” according to exit polls. Democrats wanted voters to focus on low unemployment, sustained if modest growth and a stock market that continued to expand everyone’s retirement accounts. Voters had another view: 46 percent said their family’s finances were worse today than four years ago while 24 percent said they were better; 75 percent said inflation had caused a moderate or severe hardship on them or their families. Overall, voters were in a sour mood. In the exit polls, 73 percent said they were either dissatisfied or angry. This was an environment in which voters were calling for change — as they have in every election since 2006, except for 2012, when President Barack Obama was reelected. Of the 28 percent of the electorate who said finding the candidate who could bring needed change was their priority, Trump won them by nearly 3 to 1. Given all that, it’s not so surprising that the party that held the White House and the Senate was driven out of power. Amid all the internecine finger-pointing about what Harris and her campaign could or should have done differently, and those questions are legitimate, it’s important to remember how much fundamentals affect the outcome of elections.
NOTE: And from the centrist, Liberal Patriot:
The Shattering of the Democratic Coalition (Liberal Patriot)
The Republican Party, according to Democrats, has given rein to some of the darker impulses in the national psyche, has shown flagrant disregard for democratic norms and offers little to the American people in terms of effective policy. There is considerable truth to this indictment and Democrats have not been shy about making their case in uninhibited language, including the obligatory comparison of their opponents to “fascists” and “Nazis. :” Yet Democrats cannot decisively beat their opponents as this election has shown once again. The party is uncompetitive among white working-class voters and among voters in exurban, small town, and rural America. This puts them at a massive structural disadvantage given an American electoral system that gives disproportionate weight to these voters, especially in Senate and presidential elections. To add to the problem, Democrats are now hemorrhaging nonwhite working-class voters across the country. The facts must be faced. The Democratic coalition today is not fit for purpose. It cannot beat Republicans consistently in enough areas of the country to achieve dominance and implement its agenda at scale. The Democratic Party may be the party of blue America, especially deep blue metro America, but its bid to be the party of the ordinary American, the common man and woman, is falling short. There is a simple—and painful—reason for this. The Democrats really are no longer the party of the common man and woman. The priorities and values that dominate the party today are instead those of educated, liberal America which only partially overlap—and sometimes not at all—with those of ordinary Americans. There is much more to be said about shifting voting patterns in this election (and it will be said!) But for now, these data do indicate that a lot of the trends the polls were picking up on the compression of Democratic margins among key groups was real. And that should be food for thought for Democrats as they sift through the wreckage of their shattered coalition. As they do so, here’s an idea to start with: have every Democrat ostentatiously say they subscribe to the following principles. These principles would signal to normie voters, particularly working-class voters of all races, that Democrats’ values and priorities are not so different from theirs. That’s a prerequisite for getting these voters to listen to Democrats’ pitch and take it seriously.
Equality of opportunity is a fundamental American principle; equality of outcome is not.
America is not perfect but it is good to be patriotic and proud of the country.
Discrimination and racism are bad but they are not the cause of all disparities in American society.
Racial achievement gaps are bad and we should seek to close them. However, they are not due just to racism and standards of high achievement should be maintained for people of all races.
No one is completely without bias but calling all white people racists who benefit from white privilege and American society a white supremacist society is not right or fair.
America benefits from the presence of immigrants and no immigrant, even if illegal, should be mistreated. But border security is hugely important, as is an enforceable system that fairly decides who can enter the country.
Police misconduct and brutality against people of any race is wrong and we need to reform police conduct and recruitment. However, more and better policing is needed to get criminals off the streets and secure public safety. That cannot be provided by “defunding the police”.
There are underlying differences between men and women that should not all be attributed to sexism. However, discrimination on the basis of gender is wrong and should always be opposed.
People who want to live as a gender different from their biological sex should have that right. However, biological sex is real and spaces limited to biological women in areas like sports and prisons should be preserved. Medical treatments like drugs and surgery are serious interventions that should not be available on demand, especially for children.
Language policing has gone too far; by and large, people should be able to express their views without fear of sanction by employer, school, institution or government. Free speech is a fundamental American value that should be safeguarded everywhere.
Climate change is a serious problem but it won’t be solved overnight. As we move toward a clean energy economy with an “all of the above” strategy, energy must continue to be cheap, reliable and abundant. That means fossil fuels, especially natural gas, will continue to be an important part of the mix.
We must make America more equal, but we also must make it richer. There is no contradiction between the two. A richer country will make it easier to promote equality.
Degrowth is the worst idea on the left since Communism. Ordinary voters want abundance: more stuff, more opportunity, cheaper prices, nicer, more comfortable lives. The only way to provide this is with more growth, not less.
We need to make it much easier to build things, from housing to transmission lines to nuclear reactors. That cannot happen without serious regulatory and permitting reform.
America needs a robust industrial policy that goes far beyond climate policy. We are in direct competition with nations like China, a competition we cannot win without building on cutting edge scientific research in all fields.
National economic development should prioritize the “left-behind” areas of the country. The New Deal under Franklin Roosevelt did this and we can do it today. “Trickle-down” economics from rich metropolitan areas is not working.
A Democratic Party united around these principles would be a far more appealing party to those millions of voters who are leaving the Democratic Party behind. It’s time to start calling them back.
Have a great weekend!
The Curator
Two resources to help you be a more discerning reader:
AllSides - https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news
Media Bias Chart - https://www.adfontesmedia.com/
Caveat: Even these resources/charts are biased. Who says that the system they use to describe news sources is accurate? Still, hopefully you find them useful as a basic guide or for comparison.
