Late Deciders, Crossover Voters, Hispanic Voters: 5 Factors to Watch on Election Night

The 2024 election cycle has produced some stunning and sometimes counterintuitive stories about how demographic subgroups might end up voting. We may just see a historical chasm in the way men and women vote—or don’t. Polls show we’re headed for the greatest racial realignment since the Civil Rights Act—or it could be a mirage. Young people may skip the election because they are disillusioned and vote for a third party, or they may turn out in record numbers for Kamala Harris. The more diverse Sun Belt states could pave the way for Donald Trump’s victory, but the predominantly old and white Blue Wall states could elect their first black female president.

We’ll find out soon. Although there are only a few days left until Election Day, at least 60 million people have already voted. Battleground states are beating or surpassing their early voting records. And with polls of likely voters still showing close races, any combination of factors, events or movements within the electorate could influence the outcome.

To that end, I’ve compiled a few questions that we at Vox have been tracking over the past year. Their possible answers could determine who wins the White House.

Will there be those who decide late? And what can change their minds?

The story of the final weeks of the 2024 election is a battle for swing voters whose numbers are dwindling in poll after poll. This share includes two groups: voters who are undecided about choosing one candidate or another, and voters who may have preferences but are undecided about voting at all.

However, we do not know exactly who these late decision makers are. Could they be the same working-class, non-college-educated (mostly white) voters who carried Trump to victory in the Rust Belt states in 2016 (thus skewing the polls)? Or will it be dozens of new and young (mostly people of color) voters who could give Harris an edge in Sun Belt states?

And for all of these subgroups, what message or campaign design would get them to vote if it hasn’t already convinced them? Could Harris’ late-game revival of democracy and Trump’s authoritarian leanings resonate with them? Is something like the racist and extremist rhetoric at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally a factor that might influence their opinion? Or could something like President Joe Biden’s “garbage” gaffe this week attract more support from Trump?

Either way, late decision makers will be critical. They have broken for trump by huge margins in each of the last two elections he contested. But the third time everything may be different.

Will there be a Republican crossover with Harris?

In this sense, Harris’s call for the fate of democracy and the juxtaposition of her “to-do” list with Trump’s list of “enemies” are the clearest examples of how the Democrat’s campaign has focused on Trump-skeptical Republicans as a key element in preventing a Trump victory. But will these registered Republicans cross party lines or simply emulate the role of reluctant Trump voters?

Somewhere between 15 and 20 percent of primary voters are Republican. didn’t vote for Trumpand even after she dropped out, a significant portion of those voters chose to vote for former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. Many of them are women, which partly explains the focus Harris began advertising Republican supporters like former Republican Party member Liz Cheney, her father and former Vice President Dick Cheney, and many former Republican politicians who never supported Trump.

However, partisanship is a hell of a drug. Republicans, even if they personally don’t like Trump, usually support their party’s candidate. Harris continues to ask these Trump-wary Republicans to put “country is more important than party” But if they don’t, and Harris’s argument about Trump’s threat to democracy is correct, they may have to ditch the country over” party.

Will Arab American voters shift toward Republicans?

The Gaza war and Israel’s treatment of Palestinians have been one of the defining issues of the past year, including in the electoral sphere. Biden’s behavior and response have drawn considerable resentment from more progressive and left-leaning members of the Democratic coalition, and that antipathy appears to have persisted to a lesser extent against Harris. This includes a group of voters that is influential in a key swing state: Arab American voters in Michigan.

Polls, particularly among Arab Americans, show that these voters will not support Harris to the same extent as they have supported Democratic candidates in the past: an Arab News-YouGov poll this week found Trump leads Harris among Arab Americans From 45 to 43. This is a sharp reversal from 2020, when Biden beat Trump. 24 pointsand especially 2016, when Hillary Clinton beat Trump by 34 points.

But it wasn’t always like this. Before 9/11 Arab American Voters leaned towards the Republican. Only after the Republican Party anti-Muslim and anti-Arab During the George W. Bush years, this segment of voters shifted toward Democrats, reaching highest point of 2004. And from that point on, those voters began to lean toward the Republican Party, with the share of supporters of John McCain, Mitt Romney and Trump growing from 2008 to 2012 and into 2020 (support fell slightly in 2016). The Gaza war may be accelerating a latent shift to the right that was already underway as the Republican Party shifted its foreign policy priorities, championed conservative culture war issues, and spoke of economic populism as Democrats became more culturally progressive, including on issues of gender and sexuality.

Will Trump’s bet on young black men pay off?

For much of the past year, the Trump campaign has emphasized its targeted outreach to a specific segment of the electorate: black men. With an avalanche digital advertising aimed V young black menand the use of surrogates and outside groups to reach young black voters, the campaign hoped to exploit two dynamics: Harris’ apparent weakness with black men and the Democrats’ pervasive vulnerability with young black Americans.

Traditional polling shows Harris faces trouble achieving the same levels of support that past Democratic candidates have enjoyed among black voters, and especially among black men. This is due to both social and economic reasons, including the former President Barack Obama’s theory that a certain degree of misogyny keeps some black men from supporting a black woman.

But there is a deeper weakness for the Democratic Party, as evidenced by polls showing that younger black voters may have weaker ties to a party than older cohorts black voters, and maybe more conservative than their elders. AND young black men appear more likely this year to support Trump, perhaps as a result of this weaker connection.

But it is also among the cohort of voters who are least likely to vote and who, some polls showstrengthens Harris’ position as they gear up for the election. And given the more overt racist and partisan language that Trump and his supporters have used in the final weeks of the campaign, it’s unclear whether those investments will yield big enough returns on Election Day to impact the race in battleground states.

Will Latino voters shift to the right in important states?

Whether Latino voters have been shifting toward the Republican Party since the start of the Trump administration is not really in doubt. Trump’s 2020 gains have continued among Republican candidates into the 2022 midterm elections, and polls suggest he will at least retain most of his support through the week. But since elections are decided by the Electoral College rather than the popular vote, the more interesting question is whether these gains will continue or grow in important states.

In 2020, much of the political media was captivated by Trump’s big forays into South Florida and South Texas, places that for years gave Democrats an advantage in Latino support. But Trump’s gains among Latinos have also occurred across the country, mostly in immigrant communities and in both Democratic and Republican strongholds that doesn’t necessarily affect Electoral College map results.

This year, it appears that states that may have already firmly back Trump or Harris may see their Latino population continue to shift to the right (most evident in Florida), even as Latino voters in oscillating states like ArizonaNevada and Pennsylvania are bucking the trend, according to polls, and moving toward the Democrats (or at least keeping the Democratic margin intact from 2020).

That could see Trump make greater national inroads among Latinos, but not enough in swing states to support him in important presidential races. This would be further evidence of the ongoing racial realignment between the parties, but one driven by Hispanic and Latino voters in California, New York and Texas. This has real implications for control of Congress, but unless Latinos who switch party affiliations are not in swing states, it will not affect who wins the White House.