Presidential Election of 2024

Subterms

    Latest story

    88 Shares23 Views

    Democrats Are Getting Richer. It’s Not Helping.

    by

    There have been endless laments for the white working-class voters the Democratic Party lost over the past few decades, particularly during the 10 years of the Trump era. But detailed 2024 election analyses also make it clear that upper-income white voters have become a much more powerful force in the party than they ever were before. These upscale white voters are driving the transformation of the Democratic Party away from its role as the representative of working-class America and closer to its nascent incarnation as the party of the well-to-do.A detailed analysis of data compiled by the Cooperative Election Study shows that in 2024, 46.8 percent of white Kamala Harris voters had annual household incomes over $80,000, while 53.2 percent earned less than that. In fact, according to data analysis by Caroline Soler, a research analyst for the Cooperative Election Study, the single largest bloc of white Democratic voters in 2024 — 27.5 percent — had incomes of $120,000 or more.Along similar lines, Tom Wood, a political scientist at Ohio State University, provided The Times with figures from the American National Election Studies for 2020, the most recent year for which data is available. The numbers show that white voters in the 68th to 100th income percentiles — the top third — cast 49.05 percent of their ballots for Joe Biden and 50.95 for Donald Trump. White voters in the top 5 percent of the income distribution voted 52.9 percent for Biden and 47.1 percent for Trump.These figures stand in sharp contrast to election results as recent as those of 2008. Among white voters in the top third of the income distribution that year, John McCain, the Republican nominee, beat Barack Obama 67.1 percent to 32.9 percent.Frances Lee, a political scientist at Princeton, responded by email to my inquiries about this phenomenon: “An objective look at both party’s coalitions in the mass electorate would have to acknowledge that neither Republicans nor Democrats are the ‘party of the working class.’”Instead, Lee argued:Both parties are vulnerable to charges of elitism. Republicans really do push for tax cuts that benefit the wealthy. Democrats, meanwhile, take stances on social issues that appeal to socioeconomic elites.The underlying truth, Lee continued, “is that the major parties in the U.S. today are not primarily organized around a social-class cleavage.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    More stories

    • 150 Shares24 Views

      in Elections

      An Iran Cease-Fire, and Why N.Y.C.’s Mayoral Race Matters for Democrats Everywhere

      by

      Listen to and follow ‘The Daily’Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube | iHeartRadioOvernight, Iran and Israel said they had agreed to a cease-fire — after an Iranian attack on a U.S. air base in Qatar that appeared to be a largely symbolic act of revenge.But the main topic on “The Daily” is the mayor’s race in New York City, where Tuesday is Democratic Primary Day. The race has quickly become an excruciatingly close contest between two candidates who are offering themselves as the solution to what’s wrong with their party in the age of President Trump.Nicholas Fandos, who covers New York politics for The Times, discusses the competing visions competing for the mayoralty and who is most likely to win.Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.On today’s episodeNicholas Fandos, a reporter covering New York politics and government for The New York Times.The primary has taken on national implications, with the top two candidates tapping into Democratic voters’ hunger for a fight.Angelina Katsanis and Anna Watts for The New York TimesBackground readingIn the N.Y.C. mayor’s race, top democrats take on President Trump and their own party.Here’s the latest on Israel and Iran.There are a lot of ways to listen to ‘The Daily.’ Here’s how.We aim to make transcripts available the next workday after an episode’s publication. You can find them at the top of the page.The Daily is made by Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, Sydney Harper, Michael Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Rachelle Bonja, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Rob Szypko, Elisheba Ittoop, Mooj Zadie, Patricia Willens, Rowan Niemisto, Jody Becker, Rikki Novetsky, Nina Feldman, Carlos Prieto, Ben Calhoun, Susan Lee, Lexie Diao, Mary Wilson, Alex Stern, Sophia Lanman, Shannon M. Lin, Diane Wong, Devon Taylor, Alyssa Moxley, Olivia Natt, Daniel Ramirez, Brendan Klinkenberg, Chris Haxel, Maria Byrne, Anna Foley and Caitlin O’Keefe.Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly. Special thanks to Sam Dolnick, Paula Szuchman, Lisa Tobin, Larissa Anderson, Julia Simon, Mahima Chablani, Elizabeth Davis-Moorer, Jeffrey Miranda, Maddy Masiello, Isabella Anderson, Nina Lassam, Nick Pitman and Kathleen O’Brien. More

    • 163 Shares40 Views

      in Elections

      Palm Beach, Never Richer, Is a Draw for Young MAGA. Locals Aren’t Pleased.

      by

      Donald Trump’s presidency has turned this Florida island into the nightlife headquarters of MAGA, but the town’s old guard — much of it Republican — doesn’t love the new vibe.There are no star maps on Palm Beach, and many of its biggest estates are hidden behind elaborate landscaping. To learn what belongs to whom, and how much it cost, a guide is needed, and Dana Koch, who has been selling real estate here for 22 years, knows the area cold. He’s a veteran docent in a zoo where the creatures are billionaires and it’s difficult to see the cages.“Howard and Beth Stern live here,” he said, pointing to a gate flanked by shrubbery. “This whole place, he paid about $50 million for it years ago. Now it’s worth $200 million.”On it goes, an inventory of rich and famous people, a patter that rambles along, like Mr. Koch’s car, at about 10 miles an hour. Jon Bon Jovi lives there. That’s where Roger Ailes slipped in the shower and died. William Lauder built this, after buying Rush Limbaugh’s place for $155 million and tearing it down.Some homes are identified by job (N.F.L. owner, sugar magnate) others by names, (Dr. Oz, Tom Ford, Charles Schwab). That lot once belonged to Jeffrey Epstein, whose place was razed. A new house is under construction, and the owners, Mr. Koch speculates, are going to apply for a new address.After the election last year, in one week alone, $100 million of residential real estate was sold in Palm Beach.Martina Tuaty for The New York TimesThese have been busy months for Mr. Koch, 52, who is not related to the famous Republican donors. (“Same name, different bank account.”) Palm Beach is, of course, home to President Trump’s private club, Mar-a-Lago. After the election in November, there was a “Trump bump,” with $100 million worth of property on Palm Beach going under contract in the span of a week. Late last year, the Fox News host Sean Hannity purchased a $23.5 million mansion in nearby Manalapan, then spent $14.9 million on an oceanfront townhouse in Palm Beach in January. (He’d previously spent $5.3 million for a townhouse here in 2021.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares127 Views

      in Elections

      The Abundance Agenda Has Its Own Theory of Power

      by

      I have had a fascinating few months. “Abundance,” the book I wrote with Derek Thompson, is either going to save the Democratic Party or destroy it. You think I’m kidding. Here’s The Wall Street Journal’s headline: “Can the ‘Abundance Agenda’ Save the Democrats?” Here’s The Nation: “Why the ‘Abundance Agenda’ Could Sink the Democratic Party.” The Atlantic placed the book at the center of “the coming Democratic civil war.”Before “Abundance” came out, I worried that its argument would be too agreeable to generate much debate. I didn’t foresee Ragnarok.But I was wrong about who would perceive it as a threat. The book is largely a critique of how Democrats have governed in the places where they’ve held power. But the obvious targets of that critique — blue-state governors like Gavin Newsom and Kathy Hochul and top Obama and Biden administration officials — have largely embraced it. Maura Healy, the governor of Massachusetts, laid out a plan for “housing abundance.” More than one top Democrat I expected to react defensively to the argument told me that they felt that they could have written it.This is, for Democrats, a liquid moment. The party is reimagining itself after its crushing loss in 2024, and a lot is riding on which critiques are woven into its renewal. And so the backlash to the book has come from a faction of the party that saw itself rising within the wreckage and worries that “Abundance” will derail its ascendance: the anti-corporate populists.“Abundance” is an effort to focus more of American politics on a surprisingly neglected question: What do we need more of, and what is stopping us from getting it? It is that focus that some of my friends on the populist left object to. Zephyr Teachout, a Fordham law professor who’s a central figure on the anti-monopolist left, told me that her problem with “Abundance” wasn’t the policies but the central question: “We should be focusing Democratic politics and politics in general on the problem of concentrated power and the way in which concentrated power is making it impossible to do things.”Demand Progress, a leftist advocacy group, went so far as to commission a poll to see which message appealed to more voters. Voters were asked to choose between the two framings of “the big problem” in American life: Was it “‘bottlenecks’ that make it harder to produce housing, expand energy production or build new roads and bridges” or rather that “big corporations have way too much power over our economy and our government.” Unsurprisingly, the latter won.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares126 Views

      in Elections

      JD Vance’s Campaign Plane Is Being Used for Migrant Deportation Flights

      by

      The Boeing 737 has been chartered more than a dozen times this year by the federal government to deport migrants to several countries in Central America.In its former life, the charter plane with the tail No. N917XA went by the moniker Trump Force Two.The ubiquitous red, white and blue livery logged thousands of miles last year as the campaign plane of JD Vance, who was elected as President Trump’s vice president in November.But that plane — the same one the campaign offered rides on to entice donors to give money — is now carrying out a much different and clandestine kind of task for the Trump administration.The Boeing 737 has been chartered more than a dozen times this year by the federal government to deport migrants to several Central American countries, according to public aviation logs and a group that tracks the flights.The Trump-Vance campaign rode to victory in part on its vow to undertake the largest deportation push in American history. The Trump administration has since expanded the range of people who can be targeted for removal, sped up the deportation process for others and, in some cases, tightened the rules for legal immigrants.In 2018, during President Trump’s first term, the plane was used for at least three deportation flights that took about 360 migrants to El Salvador and Guatemala, according to the Center for Human Rights at the University of Washington. The center obtained the data through a public records request.A fourth flight, chartered by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as part of what is known as its ICE Air program, was used to transfer about 144 migrants between detention centers in the United States.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      How the Ravages of Age Are Ravaging the Democratic Party

      by

      Now is the time for the Democratic Party to get serious about its oldsters problem.The furor over President Joe Biden’s cognitive issues is not going away any time soon. On Tuesday it bubbled up in the California governor’s race, when one candidate, Antonio Villaraigosa, a former mayor of Los Angeles, accused two other Democrats eyeing the governor’s mansion — former Vice President Kamala Harris and former Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra — of participating in a “cover-up” of Mr. Biden’s fading fitness in office.“Voters deserve to know the truth. What did Kamala Harris and Xavier Becerra know, when did they know it, and most importantly, why didn’t either of them speak out?” Mr. Villaraigosa fumed in a statement, spurred by tidbits from the new book “Original Sin,” which chronicles the efforts of Mr. Biden’s inner circle to conceal his mental and physical decline. Mr. Villaraigosa called on Ms. Harris and Mr. Becerra to “apologize to the American people.”Is Mr. Villaraigosa, who is 72 himself, exploiting the orgy of Biden recriminations for political ends? Probably. Does he have a point? Absolutely. Team Biden deserves much abuse for its sins. That said, last week also reminded us that the Democrats’ flirtation with gerontocracy is not confined to a single office or branch of government when, on Wednesday, the House was shaken by the death of Representative Gerry Connolly.Mr. Connolly, a 75-year-old lawmaker from Northern Virginia, had been in poor health. On Nov. 7 last year, two days after his re-election to a ninth term, he announced he had been diagnosed with esophageal cancer and would undergo treatments. Even so, in December he won a high-profile contest against Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to be the top Democrat on the Oversight Committee. The race was seen as a struggle over the future of the seniority system that has long shaped how Democrats pick committee leaders. Despite concerns about his health, seniority carried the day. On April 28, he announced that his cancer had returned and that he would not seek re-election next year. Less than a month later, he was gone.Washington being Washington, his death was greeted with sadness but also with chatter about the political repercussions in the narrowly divided House. It was not lost on Beltway pundits that if Democrats had had one more “no” vote in their deliberations over President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” Republicans would have had to sway another of their holdouts to ram it through the House last week.Mr. Connolly was the third House Democrat to die in recent months, after the deaths in March of Raúl Grijalva and Sylvester Turner, both septuagenarians. All three seats are vacant for now. Axios pointed out that eight members of Congress have died in office since November 2022. All were Democrats, with an average age of 75.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 100 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      Bruce Springsteen Will Never Surrender to Donald Trump

      by

      Since the 1980s Bruce Springsteen has been writing songs that emphasized, even romanticized, a polyglot vision of America and what it means to be an American. That vision is, broadly speaking, an updated version of New Deal America: one that recognizes not only the dignity and pride of honest labor but also the importance of respecting our differences, whether they are based on culture, gender, ethnicity or race. It’s a vision of unity summed up in the phrase that in past concert tours Mr. Springsteen has used to close out the show: “Nobody wins unless everybody wins.” And when Mr. Springsteen says “everybody,” he means everybody — including undocumented migrants and border patrol agents, unwed mothers, distant and irresponsible fathers, Black victims of police brutality and the cops who (regret) shooting them, emotionally scarred Vietnam vets and Southeast Asian war refugees trying to make America their new home.The 1980s also saw the rise of an alternative vision of America: one that sought to tear down what was left of the New Deal. Its exemplar was Donald Trump, then a tacky developer and a tabloid fixture. It was based on the idea that could be summarized as: I win only if everybody else loses. Today Mr. Trump is president, and full of petty rage at Mr. Springsteen for daring to criticize him at the opening show on his current European tour.Nothing irks Mr. Trump quite as much as the disrespect of a fellow celebrity. But it’s more than that. Mr. Springsteen, 75, and Mr. Trump, 78, are in many respects two opposing faces of modern America as it was built and performed by their generation. They offer their fan bases a promise of entirely different futures.Just as Mr. Trump’s 2024 campaign sought to make (his) America great again, Mr. Springsteen’s current Land of Hope and Dreams Tour is a nod to his idea of another, more generous vision. The lyrics to the song of the same name offer up an idealistic vision of inclusion with a train packed with “saints and sinners,” “losers and winners,” “whores and gamblers” and “lost souls.” It promises, “Dreams will not be thwarted” and “faith will be rewarded” with “bells of freedom ringing.” It may also be a reference to Joe Biden’s presidential inauguration celebration, where he sang the same tune.Introducing “Land of Hope and Dreams” as the first song on the tour’s opening night in Manchester, England, Mr. Springsteen told the crowd that the United States was “currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent and treasonous administration” that has “no concern or idea of what it means to be deeply American.”Mr. Trump heard this as a challenge. The president threatened an “investigation” into Mr. Springsteen’s support for Kamala Harris and blustered on Truth Social that this “Highly Overrated … not a talented guy” was “Just a pushy, obnoxious JERK.” Later he put out a fake video in which he hits Mr. Springsteen with a golf ball.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 150 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      Elon Musk Suggests He Will Spend ‘a Lot Less’ on Political Donations

      by

      The world’s richest person, who spent more money than anyone else last year as he helped elect President Trump, has indicated lately that he wants to turn back toward his business empire.Elon Musk was the country’s biggest political donor in 2024. But he might be ready to give up the title.Mr. Musk, the world’s richest person, said on Tuesday that he was planning to spend “a lot less” in future elections, the latest sign that he is fading into the background of American politics — at least for now.“In terms of political spending, I’m going to do a lot less in the future,” Mr. Musk said as he appeared virtually for a combative interview with Bloomberg News at the Qatar Economic Forum. “I think I’ve done enough.”He did keep the door open, however. Asked if his decision stemmed from any blowback he had faced for helping to guide the Trump administration, he said: “If I see a reason to do political spending in the future, I will do it. But I don’t currently see a reason.”Mr. Musk disclosed over $290 million in federal spending on the 2024 election cycle, most of which went toward backing Donald J. Trump through a super PAC that he started. He has told Mr. Trump’s advisers that he planned to donate about $100 million to pro-Trump groups before the 2026 midterm elections.In the months after Mr. Trump took office in January, Mr. Musk became a frequent presence in Washington as he steered an ambitious, controversial effort to sharply cut government spending. He has also remained a powerful player in Republican campaign finance. Along with an allied group, he spent roughly $25 million on a major Wisconsin Supreme Court race to back a conservative candidate who lost badly.Lately, Mr. Musk has indicated a desire to turn back to his business empire. After a sharp drop in profit at his electric-car company, Tesla, he told Wall Street analysts last month that he planned to spend less time in Washington and more on his companies.He did say on Tuesday, however, that he planned to be in Washington on Wednesday and Thursday, including for a dinner with Mr. Trump. More

    • 150 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Trump Targets Harris Campaign’s Links to Oprah Winfrey, Beyoncé and Bruce Springsteen

      by

      The president claimed without evidence on Monday that Kamala Harris had violated campaign-finance law, essentially by paying superstars for endorsements “under the guise of paying for entertainment.”President Trump is calling for a “major investigation” into the celebrities Bruce Springsteen, Beyoncé, Oprah Winfrey and Bono, bringing his retribution campaign to the music industry.Mr. Trump, in a pair of posts on Truth Social on Monday, argued that Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party nominee was violating campaign-finance law, essentially by paying those figures for endorsements “under the guise of paying for entertainment.”There is no evidence that Ms. Harris paid for the endorsements, although details on celebrity engagements can be somewhat murky. Under campaign finance law, campaigns are required to pay the fair-market value for the costs of events so as to make sure that a company or individual is not donating in excess of federal contribution limits.Ms. Harris paid $1 million to Ms. Winfrey’s production company for a live-streamed town hall in Detroit, according to campaign-finance records. Ms. Winfrey has said the money paid for costs and salaries related to the event and was not a personal fee.Beyoncé headlined a rally for Ms. Harris in her hometown of Houston for an abortion-rights event, and Ms. Harris’s campaign paid the singer’s company $165,000 in November for “campaign event production,” according to campaign-finance records. Mr. Trump falsely claimed on Monday that her payment was $11 million, citing unspecified “news reports.” The artist’s mother has called that figure a “lie.”Mr. Trump’s angry posts come as his ire has been raised against Mr. Springsteen, who sharply criticized Mr. Trump during a concert in Manchester, England, last week. Mr. Trump responded with a social media post calling him a “dried out ‘prune’ of a rocker.” Mr. Springsteen performed at a rally in Atlanta in the final weeks of the presidential race, though no records available yet show any payment from Ms. Harris’s campaign.It was not clear why Mr. Trump named Bono, the Irish singer-songwriter who fronts the band U2. While he is a friend of former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and received from him a Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country’s highest civilian award, he did not appear at any campaign events with Ms. Harris, nor did he endorse her. More