Donald Trump's victory in the 2024 election arrived was marked by the Republican significantly improving his numbers among a number of key demographics compared to his performance in 2020.
CNN exit polling of more than 22,000 voters showed that the former president's support rose among male Latinos, people under 30, those living in rural areas, and moderates. Trump also outperformed Kamala Harris in terms of younger and new voters—voting blocs that President Joe Biden dominated in the last election.
The figures showed that Harris, who would have been the first female president of the United States, was unable to improve upon Biden's support among women, despite protecting abortion rights being a crucial part of the vice president's election campaign messaging.
Polls and forecasters suggested the 2024 race would be neck-and-neck, but Trump was on pace to win the popular vote and sweep all seven battleground states from Harris as of Wednesday morning. The Associated Press called the race in favor of Trump at 5:34 a.m. ET after he flipped the swing state of Wisconsin and passed the 270 Electoral College threshold.
Newsweek has contacted Trump's and Harris' campaign teams for comment via email.
The CNN exit polls surveyed a mixture of 22,914 voters, either from Election Day or interviews with early and absentee voters conducted between October 24 and November 2. The results have a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.
Women
CNN's 2024 exit poll shows that while women favored Harris over Trump by 10 points (54 percent to 44 percent), this was down from the 15-point lead Biden had in the demographic in 2020 and the 13-point lead Hillary Clinton had over Trump in 2016's exit polling.
Trump managed to slightly increase his lead among male voters in 2024, plus 10 points, compared to 2020, plus 8.
Latino Men
Prior to Tuesday's election, there was talk about whether backlash to comedian Tony Hinchcliffe's joke calling Puerto Rico a "floating island of garbage" at a Trump rally in Madison Square Garden would damage the Republican's election hopes.
Instead, Trump was significantly more embraced by the Latino population in this election, especially among men.
The 2024 exit poll reveals that Harris holds an 8-point lead among Latino voters, 53 percent to 45 percent. In 2020, Biden's lead over Trump among Latinos was 33 points.
CNN said 2024 was the first time Latino men broke for Trump, with the Republican beating Harris among this demographic by 10 points (54 percent to 44 percent). Biden held a 23-point lead among Latino males in 2020.
Harris saw a strong 24-point lead over Trump among female Latino voters nationally, but this was down from the 39-point lead Biden held and the 44-point lead Clinton had among this group in 2016.
Younger Voters
Voters aged 18 to 29 have historically favored Democratic presidential candidates. This year, Trump managed to make inroads among this age group, reducing Biden's 24-point lead down to 13 points for Harris.
Trump also improved his numbers among those aged 45 to 64 by 8 points compared to 2020.
First-Time Voters
Trump flipped any perceived advantage Democrats may have had among first-time voters this year.
According to CNN's 2020 exit poll, 64 percent of the 15,590 first-time voters surveyed backed Biden, with 32 percent supporting Trump.
In this cycle, Trump had a 9-point lead over Harris among first-time voters in the 2024 election (54 percent to 45 percent).
Rural Voters
Trump lost ground among rural voters—a key Republican voting bloc—between the 2016 and 2020 elections, from plus 27 points to plus 15.
However, Trump saw a 12-point increase among rural voters in this year's election compared to 2020, climbing all the way back up to that 27-point margin, with the Republican securing nearly two-thirds of all the votes from this demographic (63 percent to 36 percent).
Moderate Voters
Moderate voters, who are considered especially important in swing states, backed Harris over Trump by a margin of 19 points (58 percent to 39 percent) this election.
This is a smaller margin than in 2020, when Biden beat Trump among this bloc by 30 points (64 percent to 34 percent).
In his victory speech in Florida, Trump said his campaign had built the "biggest, the broadest, the most unified coalition" in U.S. political history.
"Young and old, men and women, rural and urban. And we had them all helping us tonight," Trump said.
"They had some great analysis of the people that voted for us. Nobody's ever seen anything like that. They came from all quarters—union, nonunion, African American, Hispanic American, Asian American, Arab American, Muslim American. We had everybody, and it was beautiful. It was a historic realignment, uniting citizens of all backgrounds around a common core of common sense."
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