Ground Game: Election ‘super year,’ Trump’s 2024 inroads, Republicans’ thin majority

Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election was just the latest in a long line of losses for incumbent parties in 2024, with people in some 70 countries accounting for about half the world’s population going to the polls. 

Welcome to this week’s edition of AP Ground Game. 

President Joe Biden meets with President-elect Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, file) 

‘Super year’ of elections has been bad for incumbents 

Issues driving voter discontent have varied widely, though there has been almost universal malaise since the COVID-19 pandemic as people and businesses struggle to get back on their feet while facing stubbornly high prices, cash-strapped governments and a surge in migration. 

“There’s an overall sense of frustration with political elites, viewing them as out of touch, that cuts across ideological lines,” said Richard Wike, director of global attitudes research at the Pew Research Center. 

Wike noted that a Pew poll of 24 countries found that the appeal of democracy itself was slipping as voters reported increasing economic distress and a sense that no political faction truly represents them. Read more. 

Of note:

Since the pandemic hit in 2020, incumbents have been removed from office in 40 of 54 elections in Western democracies, said Steven Levitsky, a political scientist at Harvard University, revealing “a huge incumbent disadvantage.” 

Trump made inroads in surprising places in his path to the White House 

Although Trump’s win once again reflected a deep political divide across the United States, he made inroads in surprising places. From the suburbs of New Jersey to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s New York City congressional district to reliably liberal Hawaii, Trump gained ground even as support for Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, dropped off. 

AP VoteCast, a far-reaching survey of more than 120,000 voters nationwide, found that Trump made substantial gains among Black and Latino men, younger voters, and nonwhite voters without a college degree, compared with his 2020 performance. 

Common themes emerged in the AP VoteCast data. Voters were most likely to see the economy and immigration as top issues facing the country. More voters said their family’s financial situation was “falling behind,” compared with 2020. When they voted, Trump supporters were thinking about high prices for gas, groceries and other goods and the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border. Read more. 

Of note:

Ralph Caputo, a former state legislator from northern New Jersey, said Trump, unlike Democrats, connected with different groups of voters. Trump was sharper, too, Caputo said, because he had been tested in the primaries, something Harris did not face because of President Joe Biden’s late withdrawal from the race in July. 

“Those days are over where you just put somebody up for election and think they’re going to win because they’re on a Democratic ballot,” Caputo said. “They can’t win automatically.” 

Can Republicans figure out how to work with a thin majority? 

After one of the most chaotic and least productive sessions in modern history, voters made a surprising choice in elections for the U.S. House – they overwhelmingly stuck with the status quo. 

House Republicans will hold onto a thin majority, and while the chamber’s exact partisan divide is still to be determined as votes are tallied in a handful of states, the results of 435 House races nationwide have produced hardly any change to the makeup of the chamber. In fact, it’s more like a stalemate: Republicans and Democrats have each flipped seven seats, while just eight incumbents nationwide have lost their races. 

The results show just how entrenched the political dynamics have become in a legislative chamber that is meant to closely reflect the will of the people. Read more. 

Of note:

Neither Trump’s sweep of swing states nor a record of two years marked by infighting among GOP House members seemed to weigh much on House election results. Instead, the contest for control of the chamber boiled down to just a couple dozen politically divided districts and fewer truly close races even as House candidates nationwide spent a combined $1.5 billion, according to OpenSecrets, which tracks political spending.