Turnout Didn’t Cost Kamala Harris the Election

Nate Silver: “As you can see from the Catalist data, it’s actually common for most dropoff voters to be Democrats: this also happened to the party in 2012, 2016 and 2020. In some sense, that’s a sign of being a victim of your own success. If you’re good at turning out marginal voters, you’re happy to book the win — but they might not vote again next time.”

“In past elections, however, new voters were also Democratic, enough to more or less cancel this out. This time, however, the majority of new voters picked Trump.”

“Put another way, Democrats performed poorly among marginal voters in general: people who don’t read the news that much, and whose political views don’t match the ideologically ‘consistent’ views of strong partisans. Young voters, voters of color, and voters without college degrees are overrepresented in this cohort, all groups that Democrats struggled with in 2024 compared to previous elections.”