What Analyses of the 2024 Election Are Getting Wrong

As Democrats sift through the wreckage of 2024, they are beginning to carry out familiar procedures: post-election autopsy. Armed with exit voting, turnout data and demographic failures, analysts analyze Kamala Harris’ defeat with surgical accuracy. But like many autopsies, this risks lacking a cause of death by focusing too narrowly on the symptoms. All of these post-election reports lack the reality forest of American political tribes due to the trees of data points that were cut off.

Latest analysis from democratic data company catalysts It provides valuable insight into voter drop-offs and demographic changes. But it also perpetuates some of the most problematic trends in democratic political analysis. This is the ingredient that helped create the conditions for defeat in the first place.

The greatest weakness of the Catalyst reporting, and many other analyses from media, commentators and political operatives, are reluctance to take seriously the centrality of racial and gender animus and responsiveness as central organizing forces in American politics. Meanwhile, the Catalyst report states that “men moved to Trump in 2024… These changes were seen across race and other demographic groups,” which helps explain the modest improvements between Latinos and African Americans. However, on the other hand, the findings are listed seventh in 11 “important findings” and are just one tree in the misogynistic forest.

Similarly with race. In their sixth discovery, they almost mention that “Harris has suffered a decline in support among white men with university degrees.” Traditional wisdom explains how to move to Trump, a white man with a college education, in the election that inflation and egg prices beat Democrats?

14th century philosopher William Occum popularized the framework known as the present Occam’s Razor This is usually considered to be the simplest explanation best. In a country that has never elected a female president and has never engaged in violent, bloody civil wars explicitly animated by racial politics, the easiest explanation of the race and gender that spurred the 2024 election. Another way for the Catalyst to frame their findings was to say that Kamala Harris won among all racial groups.

The reality is that Harris was too progressive on cultural issues, not because he continues to keep the Democrats away from the fight over existential questions about whether America should be a white nation or a multi-ethnic democracy, and whether women are presidents. Trump’s appeal has always been explicitly racial, from “Mexicans are rapists” to “they’re eating dogs,” but Democrats continue to fear calling this and hiring forced advisors. And they remain confused about how to counter a man who gets caught up in the tape, proudly boasting about a woman sexually assaulting.

It is true that voter turnout has declined among major democratic constituencies, but the story is more subtle than a simple narrative of an overarching democratic failure. In fact Harris It’s increased Democratic votes totaled in Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin over 2020. In California, democratic voter turnout fell by nearly 20%, which likely reflects the reality that the state is not competitive, so the campaign overlooked it and spent voter mobilization funds elsewhere. The drop-off was not a fundamental rejection of the democratic message.

More importantly, Trump’s success came mainly from his ability to bring out conservative supporters who had not previously voted. As I wrote in NovemberThe main driving force behind the stories behind many counties that “turned over” from ostensibly blue to red is the dramatic decline in democratic votes. And it followed the previous pattern of Trump’s previous Maga voters. In 2020, for example, Trump galvanized 75,000 Republicans who had not previously voted in Hidalgo County, Texas, but Biden attracted 22,000 Democratic voters more than Obama. This story was not a Latino voter who abandoned the Democrats. It was for Republicans to eventually mobilise their dormant supporters.

Perhaps the least analyzed aspect of 2024 is the role of sexism and misogyny. The United States has never elected a female president. Until now. This is not an accident or a statistical habit. It reflects a deep, sitting attitude about leadership and power that does not disappear just because it is uncomfortable for us to discuss them.

The emergence of the “manosphere” and its impact on young men across racial boundaries are real, but based on a centuries-old foundation. In a country where women were unable to vote until the 1920s and bank accounts were not made public until the 1970s, the idea that gender played a role in Harris’ defeat is naive at best.