Why did we lose the 2024 Presidential Election? 

In the basic sense of how we lost the Presidency:

• Trump won by 229,766 votes across three states: Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. This is not a blowout, but it is a wider win than 2016 or 2020 (78k and 43k respectively).
• Trump’s Electoral College win matched national shifts. Relative to 2020, he gained vote share in 89% of counties, shifting the popular vote six points nationally and 3.5 points in swing states.

• Trump won mainly because Democrats underperformed. Relative to 2020, Trump gained about three million votes while Harris netted six million fewer votes than Biden. But in the national share of the eligible vote population, Trump gained just 0.4% while Harris lost 3.5%.

Why did this happen? The various takes could (and will) fill books – check out this bibliography for starters. But the truth is, it’s all speculative until Spring 2025 when Secretaries of State will share detailed state-by-state voter data for more robust analysis. That said, here is what we know so far:

• Globally, incumbents are losing everywhere – literally and figuratively left and right. A simple likely explanation? Economic insecurity caused by inflation following the Covid-19 pandemic. 

• This was a ‘change’ election, and Trump was the change agent. In NBC exit polling, 73% of voters were angry or dissatisfied with the country’s direction. They supported Trump by 26 points. In CBS exit polling, 30% of voters ranked “ability to lead” as the most important quality, and 27% ranked “can bring needed change.” Trump won them by 31 and 48 points each.

• Core Democratic constituencies moved to Trump. AP Votecast exit polling shows Trump made gains among young voters and voters of color. NBC exit polls show Trump won a majority of voters with no college degree and only lost Latine voters with no college degree by 51% to 47% — a 31-point gain from 2020.
• Anti-Trump voters stayed home. Democratic analyst Michael Podhorzer estimates 15 million people who voted “against” Trump in 2020 didn’t vote in 2024. This suggests Trump didn’t get much more popular; Democrats got less so.
• Trump won the “Misinformed Vote”. Polls by Ipsos, Data for Progress, NBC, and others show a dramatic divide: Harris won well-informed voters who follow traditional media, while Trump won misinformed voters, low-info voters, and consumers of non-traditional media.

• The biggest “winner” in 2024 was still the couch. More eligible voters stayed home than voted for Trump or Harris: Almost 90 million people, or 36% of the electorate. This suggests eligible voters were, overall, more fed up with our whole system than they were alarmed by Trump.

All of this is a tough pill to swallow. But when we see where we are, we can see what to do about it.