Four charts explain why Donald Trump is in trouble

ARE DEMOCRATS back from the brink? In last year’s presidential election they lost the popular vote for the first time in two decades. Swings to the right reached double digits among Hispanics and the under-30s, and six points among black voters. But elections on November 4th—the last before next year’s midterms—gave the party reason to smile. Now the dust has settled, The Economist’s data team has delved deep into the results to see whether they are a sign of bigger trouble for Donald Trump and the Republicans.

The most closely watched contests were the governors’ races in Virginia and New Jersey, where centrist Democrats who campaigned on affordability won by bigger margins than expected. Some of that can be explained by turnout. In exit polls from the Virginia race, voters were asked whom they had supported in the 2024 presidential election. Of those who had voted, a larger proportion said Kamala Harris than her actual statewide vote share—suggesting that more of Mr Trump’s supporters decided to stay at home. Exit polls from New Jersey tell a similar story. Yet turnout alone cannot explain the nine-point swing in Virginia and eight-points in New Jersey. Instead, our analysis suggests that Democratic candidates persuaded Mr Trump’s voters to switch sides.

Local election results show where the biggest swings occurred. Passaic and Hudson counties in New Jersey, which last year turned against the Democrats by 19 and 18 points respectively, recorded the biggest swings in the state towards Mikie Sherrill, the new Democratic governor-elect. Both counties have large Hispanic populations, a group that Mr Trump wooed successfully in 2024. Across the state, counties that had moved away from Democrats appeared to snap back (see chart 2).

Other minority communities also tilted back towards the Democrats. In one ward in South Paterson, which has the second-largest Arab population in the country (and home to a neighbourhood known as Little Palestine), voters shifted 56 points to the left. Ms Sherrill won more votes there than Ms Harris, even as turnout fell by 37% from last November. In Edison, where nearly half of the population is Asian, the shift was 23 points to the left.

Our analysis of Virginia points to the same pattern. In precincts with large Asian or Hispanic populations, Ms Spanberger outperformed Ms Harris by wide margins (see chart 3). National polling data confirm that non-white voters are souring on Mr Trump faster than white ones are.

Younger voters, too, appear to be drifting back. In precincts where few residents are over 60, Ms Spanberger’s advantage over her Republican rival was almost 16 points larger than Ms Harris’s (in older areas it was four points). Young voters are less partisan and cite the cost of living as their main worry, an issue that helped Mr Trump last year but now hinders him.

Two other states offered further evidence of the changing tide. Pennsylvanians were voting for judges in their highest courts; Georgians for members of the state’s public-utilities regulator. Turnout was predictably lower than in the presidential election. But both delivered landslides for Democrats, sharply improving on their 2024 margins. In Pennsylvania the party fended off a multimillion-dollar campaign to tilt the state’s courts rightward. In Georgia Democrats captured two seats on the utilities board, their first non-federal statewide wins in nearly 20 years amid growing anger over soaring energy bills. Democrats also defeated Republicans in a string of local races and ballot initiatives, including a redistricting effort in California. In deep-blue New York City, Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist, easily won the mayoral race (although he faced uninspiring opponents, and lost in parts of the city that look most like the rest of America).

Attention now turns to next year’s midterm elections, which decide control of Congress. Much could change before then, but our current polling with YouGov shows that Democrats lead the generic congressional ballot by three points. Such a margin could yield a narrow majority in the House of Representatives. But if the recovery among minorities and younger voters endures, some Republican gerrymanders may prove less secure than intended. In Texas, for example, Republican mapmakers counted on Mr Trump’s strong margins among Hispanic voters in 2024—support that now looks shakier.

The Senate is tougher. To capture a majority Democrats would need wins in states such as Alaska, Ohio and Texas—all still long shots. Success has often bred complacency in the party. But if they learn the right lessons from November 4th, they will be better prepared for the battles to come.■