When Kamala Harris was confirmed as the Democratic candidate for the United States presidential election in August, she had hoped to become the first woman, first Indian American and the second African American to make it to the White House.
Harris was expected to reverse a troubling trend for Democrats and win back Black voters, who had been drifting away from the party.
Since then, her campaign has targeted Black voters in battleground states, often with the support of the country’s first Black president, Barack Obama.
Yet as results in Tuesday’s election trickled in, a stunning fact emerged: It is Trump, not Harris, who gained support among Black voters compared with the 2020 election, as the former president won the White House.
So how much support did Trump secure from Black voters? And how did he do it?
How did Trump do with Black voters in the 2024 election?
Black voters have for decades predominantly voted for the Democratic Party — and that pattern, on the whole, hasn’t changed.
Harris appears to have won 80 percent of the Black vote, according to an exit poll by The Associated Press.
But that’s a drop of 10 percentage points compared with 2020 when the current president, Joe Biden, won nine of 10 Black votes.
The beneficiary? Trump, who won 20 percent of the Black vote this time, according to the exit poll. He had won 13 percent of the community’s vote in 2020 and 8 percent in 2016 — which in itself was the highest level of support by Black voters for any Republican since George W Bush in 2000.
How did Trump perform with Black voters in swing states?
A comparison of Black votes for both parties in some of the swing states in 2024 and 2020 shows how Trump’s support crept up in this year’s election, according to exit polls after both elections.
Georgia
Georgia was one of the most crucial swing states in the 2024 election and one of the first battleground states that went Trump’s way. He made a 1 percentage point improvement among Black voters in Georgia from the 2020 election against Biden, according to exit polls.
2024:
- Democrats: 86 percent
- Republicans: 12 percent
2020:
- Democrats: 88 percent
- Republicans: 11 percent
Michigan
Harris and the Democrats lost 2 percentage points of the Black vote in this state after growing anti-Democrat sentiment in the wake of Israel’s war on Gaza. Meanwhile, Trump made a 2 percentage point gain.
2024:
- Democrats: 90 percent
- Republicans: 9 percent
2020:
- Democrats: 92 percent
- Republicans: 7 percent
North Carolina
North Carolina saw one of the biggest shifts from Democrats to Republicans among Black voters with a 5 percentage point change from the previous election.
2024:
- Democrats: 87 percent
- Republicans: 12 percent
2020:
- Democrats: 92 percent
- Republicans: 7 percent
Pennsylvania
Trump’s victory was all but sealed when Pennsylvania was called for the Republican candidate, and here too the numbers went up for the second-time president.
2024:
- Democrats: 89 percent
- Republicans: 10 percent
2020:
- Democrats: 92 percent
- Republicans: 7 percent
Wisconsin
Voters in the state of Wisconsin had poverty, low wages and healthcare among their chief concerns, and Black voters in this state made a dramatic 13 percentage point shift towards Trump.
2024:
- Democrats: 77 percent
- Republicans: 21 percent
2020:
- Democrats: 92 percent
- Republicans: 8 percent
Nevada
The state reeling from the highest unemployment rate in the country was the only swing state where Harris made gains among Black voters compared with 2020.
2024:
- Democrats: 82 percent
- Republicans: 17 percent
2020:
- Democrats: 80 percent
- Republicans: 18 percent
Was the Black vote shift towards Trump unexpected?
Not really.
A Gallup poll in 2023 showed the proportion of Black adults in the US who consider themselves Democrats had decreased from 77 percent in 2020 to 66 percent.
Why? Today’s Black voters operate a bit more independently from previous generations, especially young Black voters, analysts say.
Historically, the Democratic Party’s legacy with the civil rights movement is what kept it popular with Black voters. However, younger Black voters do not have those same civil rights legacy attachments.
“I think a certain generation of Black voters don’t have the direct experience with the civil rights movement or the knowledge of those things because to them that’s not memory – it’s history,” said Adolphus Belk, political scientist at Winthrop University in South Carolina. “They’re coming in without an understanding of these historical contours and turns, limitations, opportunities.
“And those frustrations are being made clear in this rising percentage of Black voters that’s taking a different look at the Republican Party in general and are exploring some curiosities with Trump despite his racial baggage.”
Furthermore, Black voters were seemingly frustrated that they are receiving little from the Democratic Party in return for what they feel is long-term, steadfast support, he said.
Did the Democratic Party see this coming?
As pre-election sentiment from Black voters shifted away from Harris, the vice president went all out in her bid to woo Black voters and relied heavily on Obama’s support.
Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, were among the first to declare their support for Harris when Biden exited the presidential race and Harris began her journey as the likely Democratic nominee before the party’s national convention in August.
The Obamas then joined Harris on the campaign trail. During her campaign, Harris introduced an “opportunity agenda for Black men” that she said would give them more chances to thrive.
The proposals included $1m in forgivable small business loans.
But the party appeared to sense that this wasn’t working, and at a community event in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in October, Barack Obama berated Black men over their apparent lack of support for Harris.
“I’m speaking to men directly – part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren’t feeling the idea of having a woman as president, and you’re coming up with other alternatives and other reasons for that,” he said.
Obama’s remarks, though, were criticised by many within the Black community. “When you are trying to get a group of people to support you, you appeal to them. You don’t chide them, humiliate them and vent your anger at them,” writer Ta-Nehisi Coates told Al Jazeera in an interview.
“Who do you think is going to see that and say, ‘Yes, now I’m going to do it [vote for Harris]’?”
How did Trump increase his popularity among Black voters?
Similar to the Democratic strategy in the mid-19th century, Trump has been trying to pull away disaffected Black voters from the Democratic Party.
Trump has claimed that African Americans fared better economically under his presidency with record low unemployment. Some experts have argued, however, that this was a continuation of a downward trend that started with the Obama administration.
At a gala hosted by the Black Conservative Federation in Columbia, South Carolina, Trump said he believed he was receiving more Black support due to his four criminal cases because Blacks have been historically treated unfairly by the criminal justice system.
“And then I got indicted a second time and a third time and a fourth time. And a lot of people said that that’s why the Black people like me because they have been hurt so badly and discriminated against,” he said. “They actually viewed me as I’m being discriminated against.”
Trump was criticised and mocked for those comments. But he succeeded in securing celebrity endorsements from African American icons like Kanye West, Kodak Black, 50 Cent and Lil Wayne.
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