It is a new day in Washington as President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House and Republicans have control of the Senate and House. As prep for your upcoming inaugural events, these discussion points recap seven must-know facts from the 2024 election:
1. For the first time since the Watergate era, independents surpassed one of the major political parties to rank second in terms of party identification. Independents went from 27% in 2020 to 34% in 2024 — a 7-point increase.
2. Coming in behind independents as a percentage of the electorate, Democrats were de facto the third party in the election. Democrats went from 37% of the presidential electorate in 2020 to 31% in 2024, a 6-point drop.
3. Republicans had a historic party ID advantage. While the overall percentage of the electorate that was Republican decreased by 1%, going from 36% in 2020 to 35% in 2024, Republicans had a +4 party ID advantage after not having any advantage in the ten prior presidential elections.
4. The view of the economy was very negative. Exit polls showed that an overwhelming 75% of the electorate said inflation had posed some level of hardship for them and their families. From our post-election survey, economy/inflation was the top issue at 40%, with Republicans leading on economy issues handling +11 and inflation +12. In contrast, Democrats chose to focus their campaign messages on abortion and democracy.
5. Trump was the change candidate. Exit polls showed that the top two most important candidate qualities (out of a choice of four) were his ability to lead and to bring needed change. Trump won decisively on both attributes, leading 2:1 on the ability to lead (+33 Trump), and 3:1 on can bring needed change (+50 Trump).
6. Republicans made significant inroads with Hispanic voters with Trump winning 46% of this voter group. This is an improvement from the performances in 2016 (28%) and 2020 (32%).
7. Despite Democrats’ campaign emphasis on abortion and having a female nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris won women only by 8 points. Harris’ margin among women was significantly smaller than President Joe Biden’s 2020 margin among women (+15) and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 2016 margin among women (+13).
David Winston and Myra Miller are co-founders of the Winston Group. This was republished with permission from the Winston Group.
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