Isn't this just assimilation? Asian and Hispanic voters are becoming more average in their voting patterns, the same as Italian-Americans and Irish-Americans last century.
Whenever this post tries to tell a more complicated story than "it's just assimilation," I notice it switches to only using anecdotes rather than actual comparative data.
Do Asian voters on average care more about crime than whites? No comparisons provided. Do Hispanic voters on average care more about inflation than whites? No comparisons provided. Do either of these groups worry less about racism than they did twelve years ago? No comparisons provided.
In the absence of comparative data, I'll stick with a null hypothesis: Asian and Hispanic voters are just assimilating and becoming less distinctive. There are no magic keys to their votes, except the keys that also work for white votes.
Today, Asian voters and Hispanic voters are just American voters.
And heck, you have the shrillest voices on the left basically saying that about Asians anyhow. Also the fun statistical game where Asians don't get counted as minorities because the calculation is "under represented minorities" and they are well represented... Ok.
I've always been skeptical of claims by many liberals that racism is the biggest factor behind the fact that a majority of white people vote Republican. But, I imagine there is nevertheless a significant percentage of white people who have voted Republican over the last 50-60 years or so primarily because of their racism rather than, let's say, opposition to economic redistribution. If so, I wonder if more non-white voters voting Republican would eventually lead to fewer racist white voters voting Republican (and some becoming Democrats). I can see it happening in two ways. First, if you generally feel more comfortable in a party that's predominantly white, but you see that the Republican party is not as predominantly white as it used to be and, like the Democrat party, is becoming more racially diverse, the factor of wanting to vote for the "white" party becomes less important compared to various other factors. Second, if you are a Republican who has primarily voted Republican because of racism, but now you have more non-white people in your party that you can related to because of shared ideology, you might gradually become less racist and thus more open to a racially liberal worldview. In any case, considering the tendency of the American political system to revert to 50-50 elections, I expect that Democrats' loss of voters due to more non-white people voting Republican will eventually be made up for by more white people voting Democrat. And some formerly racist white voters becoming more liberal under an environment of lower racial polarization could be one way that this might happen.
I was going to write almost exactly this thought, thanks for stating it so clearly. I think it's time to put to bed the ideas of group X or Y voting as a collection of like-minded voters. I was thinking even before reading this article that an article entitled "Why white voters shifted right" would not have too many different explanations than "Why group X shifted right". Let's focus on more useful analysis and put this identity stuff where it belongs.
In addition to importing millions of potential new voters, the Democrats also imported the Central American habit of trying to imprison opposition political candidates.
Yup, extreme inequality (originating in Spanish/Portuguese colonialism) has caused Latin American politics to be polarized between left- and right-wing extremists.
Not so much a result of independence wars, as the fact that they became independent in the early 19th century when the US presidential system was the only real role model for republican government.
In the Old World monarchy was the standard (so when Greece, Belgium and ultimately Norway became independent they did so as monarchies) and even Brazil in South America spent most of the 19th century as a monarchy. It was probably WWI more than anything else that turned the tide in favor of republicanism.
And Weimar Germany (unlike today's Germany) was not a parliamentary system: it was a semi-presidential system like today's France.
Well written. I do not expect Democrats to gain these lost voters, especially Asian.
The social pressure to vote D was very strong, nonwhite solidarity et all. However by showing that Democrats dont value Asians as an important part of their coalition (safety and education being two most important concerns), they have lost the social pressure.
I think the gates are open to an even stronger exodus now.
During Trump’s first term Democrats were the ones addressing Asian American safety. Let’s see how effectively Trump does ANYTHING of use…and Democrats aren’t monolithic in safety…Biden was for funding police more…also to generalize and say “education” as if Republicans are good on K-12…
You could be right but I doubt it. I do agree that identity was a big part of Asians voting for Democrats as a block but while Democrats can change by taking crime seriously (the education issue has been taken care of by the SC), I don't expect Republicans to deal with the racism and shoving religion down everyone's throat among their rank and file voters. I expect Asians to remain non-aligned to either party and stop voting as a block but there are several issues that would prevent a full move towards Republicans - climate change, abortion, religion being some of them.
Asian conservatism is different from Republican conservatism. Asians are almost certainly pro-abortion rights and predominantly not Christians (except Filipinos and Koreans). The alignment is on some trans issues. Even support for gay marriage is very high among Asians. I think it's more accurate to say that Asians are to the left of center on social issues but mostly moderates and not many who are far left.
Good analysis. Another analysis on gender dynamics would be useful. It's unfair to put this on the democrat party as a whole but the leftist portion of democrats are notably contemptuous of men. A lot of men get the sense that leftists don't like them.
Terrific analysis. Many thanks to Dhaaruni Sreenivas and Noah.
This shows how a minority-based coalition can be difficult. Obviously, Asian Americans with a legitimate concern for security and African Americans with a legitimate concern for over policing don't fit obviously in the same political coalition.
I was saying in 2023 that Biden should be apologizing for inflation and other post COVID stresses, not telling everyone how great everything was.
Biden and Noah Smith are Wrong! Gasp!
This post is a critique of President Biden's current reelection messaging, in the hope he doesn't screw up and get trump elected.
It seems like if 1.9% of voters voted Harris, we would be sitting here talking about what a great message Biden and Harris shared about the economy and how he convinced America it was fine given the economic facts.
I don't think it was the wrong message, it just didn't work. And it might have worked if they had presented it more widely or had more proponents spreading that message 24/7 on social media platforms, AM radio, etc.
Was is the message that was the problem? Or was it the vibe that hit them harder? Or was is that the channels delivering the message were out of their control?
81 million people voted for Biden in 2020, but only 74 million voted for Harris in 2024. That represents a big loss of enthusiasm, not a slight shift. It is unclear whether 7 million missing Democratic voters shifted to Trump or simply sat home out of disillusionment. Those seven million were obviously gettable Democratic voters, because they voted for Biden in 2020. This was not a small loss for the Democrats, it was a 7 million missing voter shellacking. The media environment is substantially the same in 2020 and 2024, so a bad media environment cannot account for these missing seven million votes.
When you add up the final vote totals for both candidates, Trump will probably be ahead of 2020 and Harris will be behind Biden’s number. The decrease in total votes will be indicative of the number of Democratic voters who probably stayed home while Trump’s excess votes are largely likely switchers.
AIUI the main thing which non-political people used Twitter for was for real-time sports coverage.
And regarding not seeing MAGA stuff on Twitter yourself, would I be right in guessing you use the "Following" feed (containing only posts from the people you follow) rather than the default algorithmically-generated "For You" feed?
No its the algo one… I did block Musk so I don't get his intrusions into my feed. I follow a few political commentators within Europe, but don't get much from them either.
In 2024 eighty million voters voted before election day—they don't have it split yet between early voters and vote by mail. That's more than half of the 151 million who voted in 2024.
This info came from a Google search. Sounds like voting by mail remained robust.
2020 was a crazy year, with a lot more possibilities to vote, I like the idea of what you say, I just don't know if that is true. Just because 7 million people voted in 2020 doesn't mean you can expect them all the time. You might if Trump runs things into the ground again during a pandemic :)
I don't see how you call this a "shellacking", it was a 1.8% difference in votes... maybe 2% or something in PA?
Yeah, as much as I think elections are a welcome moment to regroup and rethink, I also find it annoying how we transform a noisy signal into a clean square wave the day after each election.
Ya I haven't seen much numeric breakdown in this area so I wasn't sure on reach of the different messages... sometimes it is hard for me to think that that type of messaging impacts people (somewhat similar to how ads are so ineffective).
But then I talk to a distant family member and realize this sweet young man I once knew is leaning into white nationalism because of the TikTok and gaming community they got sucked into.
I am sure there are many who do. I based my comment on the testimony of a young man who described being stopped 60 times in one year under stop and frisk in New York City.
I think people have different experiences if they are a vulnerable woman or a “suspicious looking” young man. Do you think this was the only young man in New York City who didn't receive ridiculous harassment? Or did he happen to be the most unlucky young man in New York City?
I base my opinions on polls that clearly show that African Americans are dissatisfied with crime in their neighborhoods and police not doing anything about it. Concerns about police harassment and brutality are more prevalent among progressives who don’t seem to be very good at reading data.
I agree that the 40 million do not all have the same perspective. But this was a young black man who was living a miserable life under frequent police harassment. I do not intend to forget the many innocent black people killed by the police. None of those folks are white progressives. Incidentally, I am not a white progressive. I hold a mixture of views all of which I choose for myself. Most of them are not anywhere near progressive Orthodoxy. For someone who is telling me that my research is inadequate, you sure make a lot of assumptions on the basis of no evidence whatsoever.
What do you base this claim on? Blacks people want both more and better policing. They are very much in favor of criminal justice reform. Not surprisingly, it’s complicated.
Pretty much the only thing Asian-Americans and African-Americans have in common is that that provoke white flight: in the case of African-Americans it is due to fear of crime, while in the case of Asian-Americans it is because Americans of non-Asian ancestry don't want their kids having to compete academically with the progeny of Asian "tiger moms".
So, the electorate overall became dumber this time around, and a certain segment of the Asian and Hispanic electorates became dumber as well? Thanks for clearing that up.
I mean, what could be dumber than Asians being upset about the uptick in anti-Asian crime during the pandemic -- the entirely predictable consequence of Trump and his white nationalist minions relentlessly trying pin the pandemic on the Chinese -- and then being pissed off when the Democratic mayors of a handful of cities had a hard time addressing it during the generalized pandemic-related chaos? Really dumb.
Hmmm. Maybe the only thing dumber would be Hispanic voters blaming the Biden administration for inflation and believing that Trump, by imposing tariffs on all imported goods, ridding the country of much of the workforce that harvests fruits and vegetables and slaughters cows, pigs and chickens, and dramatically lowering tax rates for corporation and billionaires, was going to make their groceries cheaper. Damn, that's stupid.
The only thing that might possibly be dumber that either of those things -- a dumbness not referenced in article -- was the belief held by some Arab- and Muslim-American voters that Trump would be "better" than Harris for Arabs and Muslims in Palestine and elsewhere, and the belief held by some Jewish-Americans that Trump would be "better" than Harris for the Jews in the US, Israel, and Europe. That's delusionality on crack.
Dumbness rules! Surely us snooty, chardonnay swillin,' drag-queen loving libruls must learn to more cravenly pander to stupid people and their stupid beliefs.
That's a failed strategy so far. Some of us stupid people don't want drag queens preaching gender fluidity to our kids in public school, no matter how cool you libruls think that is:
"Through simple activities such as “circle your pronouns” and “find your drag name,” The Dragtivity Book introduces kids to gender identity and gender fluidity in a way that is easy for them—and the adults in their lives—to grasp."
Feds are already heavily involved. For example, the Biden-Harris Ed Dept and EEOC issued rulings last April requiring that men and boys who, in the moment, claim a "female identity" must be admitted to all female-only facilities (including changing rooms and showers) at every school and every workplace in the country.
Surely the Covid pandemic almost certainly was the fault of Chinese people? If it started at a wet market then the Chinese culture that created such markets is at fault, while if it were a lab leak then the people running the lab were at fault. But either way it was the fault of Chinese people IN CHINA, and very much not the fault of Chinese-AMERICANS.
Hate crimes against Asians in the US or other Western countries in response to Covid, seems as ill-directed as non-Palestinian Arabs persecuting local Jews in reprisal for the Nakba (and in the process providing the Zionist entity with the very manpower that it would need to remain viable in the long term!)
Seems like a silly reason to not vote based on some silly amendment that makes no real impact. Especially since it didn't pass and was symbolic right?
I think voting is about choosing the best leaders to make decisions in the government. Voting on a single issue is your right... but I think you are going to be really sad over the next 4 years as you watch all the chaos and bad management from the new administration.
I don’t think you understand how much of a spit in the face it is, when you know your ancestors faced huge obstacles to integration (china towns, massacres, dot busting), and the party that loves to claim they represent your interests wont even have a single voter to break party lines.
If it was symbolic, it is symbolic how Democrats have taken for granted and abandoned Asian voters.
This is where nuance matters and you should ask WHY did they vote against it? :)
(also, this is a good example of what politicians do, but we shouldn't even notice. It was made to get people angry and riled up over nothing IMO. Often there are a lot of political bullshit involved in this stuff)
The amendment was proposed by Ted Cruz, so keep that in mind...
- Many Democrats viewed the amendment as an indirect attack on affirmative action policies, which consider race as one factor in college admissions to promote diversity. They were concerned that the amendment could undermine these policies by penalizing institutions that implement them.
- The primary focus of the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act was to address the surge in hate crimes against Asian Americans during the pandemic. Democrats believed that introducing provisions related to college admissions diverted attention from the bill’s main objective.
- There were concerns about the practical implications of enforcing such a prohibition on federal funding. Determining what constitutes discrimination in admissions processes can be complex, and implementing this amendment could lead to legal challenges and administrative burdens for educational institutions.
It almost certainly WAS an attack on affirmative action, and the point is that affirmative action is designed to benefit specific groups (such as Blacks) at the expense of those who would benefit from pure meritocracy.
And the losers from affirmative action will be disproportionately Asian because of the Asian emphasis on academic excellence.
Also, denial of issues within the coalition and then saying nothingburger is precisely how the coalition has shrunk. It seems the Dems are now saying, “we care about so and so issues, and if you have anything else that you care about, shove it”.
Which is why the freewheeling chaotic republicans are picking up more voters.
Seems like a lot of people just voted because of the pain of inflation stuck hard in their minds.
Wait 2 years and see where the pain is then and how the other political party evolves their message. I mean we see this every 2/4 years as small percentages decide these elections in only a few states.
It honestly doesn’t help. The Affirmative Action ruling showed how vulgar and racist some colleges are when it comes to assessing Asian performance and it had to go.
The Hate Crime bill was a federal gesture, but local DAs didn’t do squat.
The Democrats can come up with many excuses, but I don’t think Asians are going to seriously be a majority in their coalition anytime soon.
YES. The Harvard case showed convincingly that Asians were experiencing racial discrimination. Democrats showed ZERO INTEREST in that racism! Let that sink in for a moment. Imagine how hypocritical that felt after all the talk of the other party's racist intents.
Democrats showed they cared about representation, not racism. That's not the Asian position on the issue.
I'm gonna have to disagree. I'd say Democrats showed a LOT of interest in that racism, as in they encourage it to achieve their desired skin (but not thought) diversity. Isn't that what the Ani-Racism is all about? Being racist on purpose to achieve some result?
And, if they did not actually support (in this case) anti-Asian racism, maybe they should have been more vocal about it.
Given that the margins were so tight in this race and battleground stats, seems likely 2% will flip back once the new admin starts running things into the ground.
I suspect this is correct, but it won't end there. The financial problems the government faces are mostly imposed by non-political forces and the choices necessary to fix them would take a long time to bear fruit while being extremely painful in the short run. So I don't expect either party to make them. They will continue to kick the can and let things deteriorate and control will bounce back and forth between the parties as disgruntled citizens vote for whoever is out of power.
As an Asian, I would have preferred a direct attack on affirmative action rather than an indirect one. Democrats have continually betrayed Asian Americans while counting on the other team being so racist that Asian Americans have no real alternative, so it was going to reach a tipping point at some point.
A careful analysis shows that Harris would have almost certainly been better than Trump for most Asian Americans. A careful analysis also shows that voting for Trump in CA, NY, HI, etc. is almost like voting for not PAP in Singapore, a useful way to express displeasure without actually doing something rash. It's not like loyalty to Democrats resulted in anything beyond lip service about safety during the pandemic, or a warm welcome into Democrat stronghold institutions.
And most voters don't do so after a careful analysis anyways.
Isn't it funny how there are all sorts of legal bans on racial discrimination all over the place that are considered absolutely sacrosanct by the Democrats, but as soon as you try to ban the racial discrimination that they want to do it becomes:
> Determining what constitutes discrimination in admissions processes can be complex, and implementing this amendment could lead to legal challenges and administrative burdens
Pretty much all groups (with some exceptions) and most areas moved away from the Democrats and toward Republicans this year, compared to 2020 and 2016. One can imagine specific reasons for each group (and the author does here, such as for Asians) but when the movement is general, then there's probably a more general reason, and it has to reflect a new factor, i.e., one that wasn't around or had far less resonance in the two prior elections.
That's why I think this election was overwhelmingly about the economy, and especially about inflation. And if I'm the Democrats, I almost have to shrug my shoulders and say, "What the hell can you do?"
In October 1984, the unemployment rate was 7.4%, the annual CPI was 4.2% and the 30 year mortgage rate was 14.2%, for an expanded misery index of 25.8.
In October 2024, the unemployment rate was 4.2%, the annual CPI was 2.4% and the 30 year mortgage rate was 6.1%, for an expanded misery index of 12.7.
Things were literally *twice* as bad when voters went to the polls in 1984 compared to 2024. And Reagan won 59% of the popular vote and 49 states compared to Harris who . . . did not.
Oh, and was Reagan riding the wave of incredible improvement and momentum? Two years before, in October 1982, the expanded misery index was 30 whereas in October 2022 it was 18. That is, there was slightly *more* improvement over the two years prior to 2024 than in the two years prior to 1984.
In other words, the election wasn't about the economy either. It was about voters' *perception* of the economy, and they reacted in a way that the previous generation in 1984 would have seen as incoherent and incomprehensible.
This is something we need to ponder long and hard. Why are these two cases so radically different?
I'm just saying that the Americans in 2024 were not like the Americans in 1984. One can argue about whether that is good or bad. I'm on the bad side. Grow up, people.
Anyway, regarding the amount of inflation in the past few years, Americans' total income (including those COVID checks) exceeded inflation so they were no worse off (and probably better off) than they were before. And yet they screamed like it was the worst thing that ever happened to them.
On the academic excellence point are they really sitting with enough good teachers to go around and just refusing to offer sections of algebra?
Like from a red state where we’re routinely having staffing problems for below level math it’s just hard to believe that this isn’t staff triage with a social justice wrapper. We do the opposite and have too many kids in intensive marh with new teachers who flame out fast.
I actually don’t know what’s going on in blue state’s beyond what I read but in Florida we have an army of one-two year teachers who never get through the learning curve years teaching in many of our schools charter and neighborhood schools have this problem.
I don’t know if this is the kind of thing afflicting schools in blue states or its opposite bad situations.
While black Americans are if anything more indigenous than whites, as the transatlantic slave trade ended in 1808 while there was mass white immigration throughout the 19th century.
Isn't this just assimilation? Asian and Hispanic voters are becoming more average in their voting patterns, the same as Italian-Americans and Irish-Americans last century.
Whenever this post tries to tell a more complicated story than "it's just assimilation," I notice it switches to only using anecdotes rather than actual comparative data.
Do Asian voters on average care more about crime than whites? No comparisons provided. Do Hispanic voters on average care more about inflation than whites? No comparisons provided. Do either of these groups worry less about racism than they did twelve years ago? No comparisons provided.
In the absence of comparative data, I'll stick with a null hypothesis: Asian and Hispanic voters are just assimilating and becoming less distinctive. There are no magic keys to their votes, except the keys that also work for white votes.
Today, Asian voters and Hispanic voters are just American voters.
And heck, you have the shrillest voices on the left basically saying that about Asians anyhow. Also the fun statistical game where Asians don't get counted as minorities because the calculation is "under represented minorities" and they are well represented... Ok.
I've always been skeptical of claims by many liberals that racism is the biggest factor behind the fact that a majority of white people vote Republican. But, I imagine there is nevertheless a significant percentage of white people who have voted Republican over the last 50-60 years or so primarily because of their racism rather than, let's say, opposition to economic redistribution. If so, I wonder if more non-white voters voting Republican would eventually lead to fewer racist white voters voting Republican (and some becoming Democrats). I can see it happening in two ways. First, if you generally feel more comfortable in a party that's predominantly white, but you see that the Republican party is not as predominantly white as it used to be and, like the Democrat party, is becoming more racially diverse, the factor of wanting to vote for the "white" party becomes less important compared to various other factors. Second, if you are a Republican who has primarily voted Republican because of racism, but now you have more non-white people in your party that you can related to because of shared ideology, you might gradually become less racist and thus more open to a racially liberal worldview. In any case, considering the tendency of the American political system to revert to 50-50 elections, I expect that Democrats' loss of voters due to more non-white people voting Republican will eventually be made up for by more white people voting Democrat. And some formerly racist white voters becoming more liberal under an environment of lower racial polarization could be one way that this might happen.
I was going to write almost exactly this thought, thanks for stating it so clearly. I think it's time to put to bed the ideas of group X or Y voting as a collection of like-minded voters. I was thinking even before reading this article that an article entitled "Why white voters shifted right" would not have too many different explanations than "Why group X shifted right". Let's focus on more useful analysis and put this identity stuff where it belongs.
In addition to importing millions of potential new voters, the Democrats also imported the Central American habit of trying to imprison opposition political candidates.
Is trying to steal an election using fake electors as American as apple pie?
Yup, extreme inequality (originating in Spanish/Portuguese colonialism) has caused Latin American politics to be polarized between left- and right-wing extremists.
Not so much a result of independence wars, as the fact that they became independent in the early 19th century when the US presidential system was the only real role model for republican government.
In the Old World monarchy was the standard (so when Greece, Belgium and ultimately Norway became independent they did so as monarchies) and even Brazil in South America spent most of the 19th century as a monarchy. It was probably WWI more than anything else that turned the tide in favor of republicanism.
And Weimar Germany (unlike today's Germany) was not a parliamentary system: it was a semi-presidential system like today's France.
Well written. I do not expect Democrats to gain these lost voters, especially Asian.
The social pressure to vote D was very strong, nonwhite solidarity et all. However by showing that Democrats dont value Asians as an important part of their coalition (safety and education being two most important concerns), they have lost the social pressure.
I think the gates are open to an even stronger exodus now.
During Trump’s first term Democrats were the ones addressing Asian American safety. Let’s see how effectively Trump does ANYTHING of use…and Democrats aren’t monolithic in safety…Biden was for funding police more…also to generalize and say “education” as if Republicans are good on K-12…
You could be right but I doubt it. I do agree that identity was a big part of Asians voting for Democrats as a block but while Democrats can change by taking crime seriously (the education issue has been taken care of by the SC), I don't expect Republicans to deal with the racism and shoving religion down everyone's throat among their rank and file voters. I expect Asians to remain non-aligned to either party and stop voting as a block but there are several issues that would prevent a full move towards Republicans - climate change, abortion, religion being some of them.
Correct. In my experience Asians are more conservative though, so the vote block is broken.
(Some Indianisms in there for you. Vote Block).
Asian conservatism is different from Republican conservatism. Asians are almost certainly pro-abortion rights and predominantly not Christians (except Filipinos and Koreans). The alignment is on some trans issues. Even support for gay marriage is very high among Asians. I think it's more accurate to say that Asians are to the left of center on social issues but mostly moderates and not many who are far left.
Well educational polarization would swing Asians further left, but I’ve found South Asians and Asian muslims to be quite conservative.
Then you also have the preference for lower business taxes for small business owners.
Much more divisive now that social pressure isnt a part of the equation
Republicans are profoundly anti-education. This is a deal breaks for Asians.
Good analysis. Another analysis on gender dynamics would be useful. It's unfair to put this on the democrat party as a whole but the leftist portion of democrats are notably contemptuous of men. A lot of men get the sense that leftists don't like them.
Men deserve some of that. Sure "not all men" but damn it, we do ourselves no favors some times.
Terrific analysis. Many thanks to Dhaaruni Sreenivas and Noah.
This shows how a minority-based coalition can be difficult. Obviously, Asian Americans with a legitimate concern for security and African Americans with a legitimate concern for over policing don't fit obviously in the same political coalition.
I was saying in 2023 that Biden should be apologizing for inflation and other post COVID stresses, not telling everyone how great everything was.
Biden and Noah Smith are Wrong! Gasp!
This post is a critique of President Biden's current reelection messaging, in the hope he doesn't screw up and get trump elected.
Sep 22, 2023 • Kathleen Weber
https://kathleenweber.substack.com/p/biden-and-noah-smith-are-wrong-gasp
It seems like if 1.9% of voters voted Harris, we would be sitting here talking about what a great message Biden and Harris shared about the economy and how he convinced America it was fine given the economic facts.
I don't think it was the wrong message, it just didn't work. And it might have worked if they had presented it more widely or had more proponents spreading that message 24/7 on social media platforms, AM radio, etc.
Was is the message that was the problem? Or was it the vibe that hit them harder? Or was is that the channels delivering the message were out of their control?
81 million people voted for Biden in 2020, but only 74 million voted for Harris in 2024. That represents a big loss of enthusiasm, not a slight shift. It is unclear whether 7 million missing Democratic voters shifted to Trump or simply sat home out of disillusionment. Those seven million were obviously gettable Democratic voters, because they voted for Biden in 2020. This was not a small loss for the Democrats, it was a 7 million missing voter shellacking. The media environment is substantially the same in 2020 and 2024, so a bad media environment cannot account for these missing seven million votes.
When you add up the final vote totals for both candidates, Trump will probably be ahead of 2020 and Harris will be behind Biden’s number. The decrease in total votes will be indicative of the number of Democratic voters who probably stayed home while Trump’s excess votes are largely likely switchers.
The main change in the media landscape between 2020 and 2024 was Elon Musk taking over Twitter and turning it into a MAGA propaganda machine.
I have a hard time believing that, I use Twitter daily to follow econ and SEO people and don't see anything MAGA.
I also don't think most voters are on Twitter. I have a hard time thinking that is anything but a small group of die hard fans.
https://www.wsj.com/politics/elections/x-twitter-political-content-election-2024-28f2dadd
Thanks hadn't seen that WSJ article
AIUI the main thing which non-political people used Twitter for was for real-time sports coverage.
And regarding not seeing MAGA stuff on Twitter yourself, would I be right in guessing you use the "Following" feed (containing only posts from the people you follow) rather than the default algorithmically-generated "For You" feed?
No its the algo one… I did block Musk so I don't get his intrusions into my feed. I follow a few political commentators within Europe, but don't get much from them either.
I have doubts about whether 2020 is a valid year for comparison. The circumstances were unique and the turnout was absolutely historic.
It might be the case that a lot of people can muster the motivation to mail a ballot, but not head to the polls.
I read the chart more carefully and the number of accidents due to police chases went from 230 to 160, A reduction of 30% in crashes.
In 2020, 43% of voters cast ballots by mail.
In 2024 eighty million voters voted before election day—they don't have it split yet between early voters and vote by mail. That's more than half of the 151 million who voted in 2024.
This info came from a Google search. Sounds like voting by mail remained robust.
2020 was a crazy year, with a lot more possibilities to vote, I like the idea of what you say, I just don't know if that is true. Just because 7 million people voted in 2020 doesn't mean you can expect them all the time. You might if Trump runs things into the ground again during a pandemic :)
I don't see how you call this a "shellacking", it was a 1.8% difference in votes... maybe 2% or something in PA?
Yeah, as much as I think elections are a welcome moment to regroup and rethink, I also find it annoying how we transform a noisy signal into a clean square wave the day after each election.
I'd change that last question to the more emphatic "Or was it that the channels delivering their message were under their opponents' control?"
Ya I haven't seen much numeric breakdown in this area so I wasn't sure on reach of the different messages... sometimes it is hard for me to think that that type of messaging impacts people (somewhat similar to how ads are so ineffective).
But then I talk to a distant family member and realize this sweet young man I once knew is leaning into white nationalism because of the TikTok and gaming community they got sucked into.
When in doubt, look to data:
https://blueprint2024.com/polling/why-trump-reasons-11-8/
How likely do you think it is that Trump supporters would lie about the reason for voting the way they did?
By all means, keep ignoring political reality. How many more elections do you think the Democrats will lose before they figure it out?
African Americans are more concerned with under policing than over policing in their neighborhoods. This is such a white progressive view.
I am sure there are many who do. I based my comment on the testimony of a young man who described being stopped 60 times in one year under stop and frisk in New York City.
One person’s view is not representative of the views of 40+ million people.
I think people have different experiences if they are a vulnerable woman or a “suspicious looking” young man. Do you think this was the only young man in New York City who didn't receive ridiculous harassment? Or did he happen to be the most unlucky young man in New York City?
I base my opinions on polls that clearly show that African Americans are dissatisfied with crime in their neighborhoods and police not doing anything about it. Concerns about police harassment and brutality are more prevalent among progressives who don’t seem to be very good at reading data.
I agree that the 40 million do not all have the same perspective. But this was a young black man who was living a miserable life under frequent police harassment. I do not intend to forget the many innocent black people killed by the police. None of those folks are white progressives. Incidentally, I am not a white progressive. I hold a mixture of views all of which I choose for myself. Most of them are not anywhere near progressive Orthodoxy. For someone who is telling me that my research is inadequate, you sure make a lot of assumptions on the basis of no evidence whatsoever.
What do you base this claim on? Blacks people want both more and better policing. They are very much in favor of criminal justice reform. Not surprisingly, it’s complicated.
Polls, where they say that violence/crime in their neighborhoods is the biggest issue, followed by economic issues and then housing.
https://www.pewresearch.org/2022/04/14/black-americans-place-and-community/
Pretty much the only thing Asian-Americans and African-Americans have in common is that that provoke white flight: in the case of African-Americans it is due to fear of crime, while in the case of Asian-Americans it is because Americans of non-Asian ancestry don't want their kids having to compete academically with the progeny of Asian "tiger moms".
Good summary/analysis of the data we have so far
So, the electorate overall became dumber this time around, and a certain segment of the Asian and Hispanic electorates became dumber as well? Thanks for clearing that up.
I mean, what could be dumber than Asians being upset about the uptick in anti-Asian crime during the pandemic -- the entirely predictable consequence of Trump and his white nationalist minions relentlessly trying pin the pandemic on the Chinese -- and then being pissed off when the Democratic mayors of a handful of cities had a hard time addressing it during the generalized pandemic-related chaos? Really dumb.
Hmmm. Maybe the only thing dumber would be Hispanic voters blaming the Biden administration for inflation and believing that Trump, by imposing tariffs on all imported goods, ridding the country of much of the workforce that harvests fruits and vegetables and slaughters cows, pigs and chickens, and dramatically lowering tax rates for corporation and billionaires, was going to make their groceries cheaper. Damn, that's stupid.
The only thing that might possibly be dumber that either of those things -- a dumbness not referenced in article -- was the belief held by some Arab- and Muslim-American voters that Trump would be "better" than Harris for Arabs and Muslims in Palestine and elsewhere, and the belief held by some Jewish-Americans that Trump would be "better" than Harris for the Jews in the US, Israel, and Europe. That's delusionality on crack.
Dumbness rules! Surely us snooty, chardonnay swillin,' drag-queen loving libruls must learn to more cravenly pander to stupid people and their stupid beliefs.
Only if you want to win. :)
Win the stupid people vote? I'd rather try educating the stupid people first.
That's a failed strategy so far. Some of us stupid people don't want drag queens preaching gender fluidity to our kids in public school, no matter how cool you libruls think that is:
https://www.dshnyc.org/dragtivitybook
"Through simple activities such as “circle your pronouns” and “find your drag name,” The Dragtivity Book introduces kids to gender identity and gender fluidity in a way that is easy for them—and the adults in their lives—to grasp."
Kudos, then, for acknowledging that you are a stupid person. You're not wrong!
Enjoy Trump 2.0! You deserve every minute of it.
And may all your children be trans!
Wouldn't issues like that be more appropriately dealt with at a local rather than a federal level?
Feds are already heavily involved. For example, the Biden-Harris Ed Dept and EEOC issued rulings last April requiring that men and boys who, in the moment, claim a "female identity" must be admitted to all female-only facilities (including changing rooms and showers) at every school and every workplace in the country.
That’s about the most white supremacist post ever written.
Surely the Covid pandemic almost certainly was the fault of Chinese people? If it started at a wet market then the Chinese culture that created such markets is at fault, while if it were a lab leak then the people running the lab were at fault. But either way it was the fault of Chinese people IN CHINA, and very much not the fault of Chinese-AMERICANS.
Hate crimes against Asians in the US or other Western countries in response to Covid, seems as ill-directed as non-Palestinian Arabs persecuting local Jews in reprisal for the Nakba (and in the process providing the Zionist entity with the very manpower that it would need to remain viable in the long term!)
So, you're an AI?
No, what would make you say that?
Top political scientists on what drove Latino vote
https://goodauthority.org/news/the-real-reasons-latino-voters-are-moving-to-the-republican-party/
Is "crater" a transitive verb? Can you say a group "cratered rightward?" Seems weird
I usually use "crater" to mean "decrease".
In normal usage it can be. “The meteors cratered the moon’s surface”.
Good call. But in this political sense? I thought cratered just meant "collapsed utterly"
I think it's fair use.
tps://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1171/vote_117_1_00162.htm
I would have voted for Kamala, but why would any Asian vote democratic after federal democrats pulled this
(I can’t vote).
Seems like a silly reason to not vote based on some silly amendment that makes no real impact. Especially since it didn't pass and was symbolic right?
I think voting is about choosing the best leaders to make decisions in the government. Voting on a single issue is your right... but I think you are going to be really sad over the next 4 years as you watch all the chaos and bad management from the new administration.
I don’t think you understand how much of a spit in the face it is, when you know your ancestors faced huge obstacles to integration (china towns, massacres, dot busting), and the party that loves to claim they represent your interests wont even have a single voter to break party lines.
If it was symbolic, it is symbolic how Democrats have taken for granted and abandoned Asian voters.
A vote is a chess move, not a love letter.
This is where nuance matters and you should ask WHY did they vote against it? :)
(also, this is a good example of what politicians do, but we shouldn't even notice. It was made to get people angry and riled up over nothing IMO. Often there are a lot of political bullshit involved in this stuff)
The amendment was proposed by Ted Cruz, so keep that in mind...
- Many Democrats viewed the amendment as an indirect attack on affirmative action policies, which consider race as one factor in college admissions to promote diversity. They were concerned that the amendment could undermine these policies by penalizing institutions that implement them.
- The primary focus of the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act was to address the surge in hate crimes against Asian Americans during the pandemic. Democrats believed that introducing provisions related to college admissions diverted attention from the bill’s main objective.
- There were concerns about the practical implications of enforcing such a prohibition on federal funding. Determining what constitutes discrimination in admissions processes can be complex, and implementing this amendment could lead to legal challenges and administrative burdens for educational institutions.
Hope that helps...
A whole lot of nothingburger.
It almost certainly WAS an attack on affirmative action, and the point is that affirmative action is designed to benefit specific groups (such as Blacks) at the expense of those who would benefit from pure meritocracy.
And the losers from affirmative action will be disproportionately Asian because of the Asian emphasis on academic excellence.
Also, denial of issues within the coalition and then saying nothingburger is precisely how the coalition has shrunk. It seems the Dems are now saying, “we care about so and so issues, and if you have anything else that you care about, shove it”.
Which is why the freewheeling chaotic republicans are picking up more voters.
Maybe, maybe not :)
Seems like a lot of people just voted because of the pain of inflation stuck hard in their minds.
Wait 2 years and see where the pain is then and how the other political party evolves their message. I mean we see this every 2/4 years as small percentages decide these elections in only a few states.
It honestly doesn’t help. The Affirmative Action ruling showed how vulgar and racist some colleges are when it comes to assessing Asian performance and it had to go.
The Hate Crime bill was a federal gesture, but local DAs didn’t do squat.
The Democrats can come up with many excuses, but I don’t think Asians are going to seriously be a majority in their coalition anytime soon.
YES. The Harvard case showed convincingly that Asians were experiencing racial discrimination. Democrats showed ZERO INTEREST in that racism! Let that sink in for a moment. Imagine how hypocritical that felt after all the talk of the other party's racist intents.
Democrats showed they cared about representation, not racism. That's not the Asian position on the issue.
"Democrats showed ZERO INTEREST in that racism!"
I'm gonna have to disagree. I'd say Democrats showed a LOT of interest in that racism, as in they encourage it to achieve their desired skin (but not thought) diversity. Isn't that what the Ani-Racism is all about? Being racist on purpose to achieve some result?
And, if they did not actually support (in this case) anti-Asian racism, maybe they should have been more vocal about it.
We will find out in 2 and 4 years I gather :)
Given that the margins were so tight in this race and battleground stats, seems likely 2% will flip back once the new admin starts running things into the ground.
I suspect this is correct, but it won't end there. The financial problems the government faces are mostly imposed by non-political forces and the choices necessary to fix them would take a long time to bear fruit while being extremely painful in the short run. So I don't expect either party to make them. They will continue to kick the can and let things deteriorate and control will bounce back and forth between the parties as disgruntled citizens vote for whoever is out of power.
Yeah, this is going to flip back quite quickly once Trump blows up.
As an Asian, I would have preferred a direct attack on affirmative action rather than an indirect one. Democrats have continually betrayed Asian Americans while counting on the other team being so racist that Asian Americans have no real alternative, so it was going to reach a tipping point at some point.
A careful analysis shows that Harris would have almost certainly been better than Trump for most Asian Americans. A careful analysis also shows that voting for Trump in CA, NY, HI, etc. is almost like voting for not PAP in Singapore, a useful way to express displeasure without actually doing something rash. It's not like loyalty to Democrats resulted in anything beyond lip service about safety during the pandemic, or a warm welcome into Democrat stronghold institutions.
And most voters don't do so after a careful analysis anyways.
Isn't it funny how there are all sorts of legal bans on racial discrimination all over the place that are considered absolutely sacrosanct by the Democrats, but as soon as you try to ban the racial discrimination that they want to do it becomes:
> Determining what constitutes discrimination in admissions processes can be complex, and implementing this amendment could lead to legal challenges and administrative burdens
Pretty much all groups (with some exceptions) and most areas moved away from the Democrats and toward Republicans this year, compared to 2020 and 2016. One can imagine specific reasons for each group (and the author does here, such as for Asians) but when the movement is general, then there's probably a more general reason, and it has to reflect a new factor, i.e., one that wasn't around or had far less resonance in the two prior elections.
That's why I think this election was overwhelmingly about the economy, and especially about inflation. And if I'm the Democrats, I almost have to shrug my shoulders and say, "What the hell can you do?"
In October 1984, the unemployment rate was 7.4%, the annual CPI was 4.2% and the 30 year mortgage rate was 14.2%, for an expanded misery index of 25.8.
In October 2024, the unemployment rate was 4.2%, the annual CPI was 2.4% and the 30 year mortgage rate was 6.1%, for an expanded misery index of 12.7.
Things were literally *twice* as bad when voters went to the polls in 1984 compared to 2024. And Reagan won 59% of the popular vote and 49 states compared to Harris who . . . did not.
Oh, and was Reagan riding the wave of incredible improvement and momentum? Two years before, in October 1982, the expanded misery index was 30 whereas in October 2022 it was 18. That is, there was slightly *more* improvement over the two years prior to 2024 than in the two years prior to 1984.
In other words, the election wasn't about the economy either. It was about voters' *perception* of the economy, and they reacted in a way that the previous generation in 1984 would have seen as incoherent and incomprehensible.
This is something we need to ponder long and hard. Why are these two cases so radically different?
Overall inflation. No point telling people that the inflation rate is 2% so they should be happy when it was higher for the last 3 years.
In total the inflation rate was 16% in biden‘s terms and 8% in the Trump era.
I'm just saying that the Americans in 2024 were not like the Americans in 1984. One can argue about whether that is good or bad. I'm on the bad side. Grow up, people.
Anyway, regarding the amount of inflation in the past few years, Americans' total income (including those COVID checks) exceeded inflation so they were no worse off (and probably better off) than they were before. And yet they screamed like it was the worst thing that ever happened to them.
On the academic excellence point are they really sitting with enough good teachers to go around and just refusing to offer sections of algebra?
Like from a red state where we’re routinely having staffing problems for below level math it’s just hard to believe that this isn’t staff triage with a social justice wrapper. We do the opposite and have too many kids in intensive marh with new teachers who flame out fast.
And maybe states like California have teacher shortages in the first place due to their sky-high housing costs?
Oh, and do you mean that the kids are flaming out fast, or the teachers?
I actually don’t know what’s going on in blue state’s beyond what I read but in Florida we have an army of one-two year teachers who never get through the learning curve years teaching in many of our schools charter and neighborhood schools have this problem.
I don’t know if this is the kind of thing afflicting schools in blue states or its opposite bad situations.
Regarding your point 5, wouldn't most Americans class Haitians as "Black" rather than "Latino"?
She addresses that concern in one of her footnotes. But I think Americans view both Latino and Haitians as part of an uninvited wave of immigration.
While black Americans are if anything more indigenous than whites, as the transatlantic slave trade ended in 1808 while there was mass white immigration throughout the 19th century.
¿Porqué no los dos?