Wednesday, November 6, 2024

The key swings that handed Trump the White House – a visual analysis

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Donald Trump has won the majority of electoral college votes to defeat Kamala Harris in the 2024 US presidential election.

Despite polling gains for the Democrats after Biden’s exit from the race in July, Harris failed to maintain a lead and the election was neck-and-neck in the final weeks of the campaign.

As of 9.10 ET (14.10 GMT) on Wednesday, more than 2,800 of nearly 3,200 counties had returned more than 90% of their votes. The results show that America has firmly swung back to the Republicans. The Democrats won 2020 by expanding their share of votes across the country, but 90% of counties swung back to the Republicans in 2024.

The Republicans managed to take three key swing states: Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Georgia. That was enough to win, even with Nevada and Arizona races still undeclared. At the time of publication, no swing state had been called for the Democrats.

Below, there is a granular picture of how Trump won the election by looking at how every county’s vote has changed compared with the 2020 presidential election.

While not every vote has been counted, it is clear that the results leave the map in a sea of red.

Trump managed to win by gaining support across the board. This has left him in a position to gain not only a majority of electoral college votes. He is also likely to win the popular vote.

Data notes

The election results on this page are reported by the Associated Press. AP “call” the winner in a state when they determine that the trailing candidate has no path to victory. This can happen before 100% of votes in a state have been counted.

Estimates for the total vote in each state are also provided by AP. The numbers update throughout election night and in the following days as more data on voter turnout becomes available.

Official results can take days or weeks to be fully finalised. This is often because of the verification process of absentee, mail-in and provisional ballots. In some states, mail-in ballots can be received and counted several days after election day.

County results are only included in the interactive if over 90% of precincts within the county have reported ballot data.

Demographic data used has been sourced from the US Census American Community Survey 2022 five-year estimates.

Design by Harry Fischer

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