Analysis: How Biden won: He built on Clinton’s successes
And Biden won the presidency even as President Donald Trump’s base largely stuck with him.
If you were looking to determine who would win by whether Trump held onto his base, you’d have been led astray.
Biden emerged victorious by winning an even larger share of the Democratic base than Clinton in 2016 and picking off voters in the middle of the electorate.
Biden earned 89% of self-described liberals and 94% of self-described Democrats. Clinton took 84% of liberals and 89% of Democrats.
In fact, Biden’s 94% among Democrats was the highest ever for a Democratic nominee since the first exit poll in 1972. His 89% among liberals was tied for the highest.
Where Biden won this election, though, was in the middle. His 64% among self-described moderates ran 12 points ahead of Clinton’s. It was the greatest on record for any Democrat since exit polls were implemented.
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But Biden’s win goes deeper than party and ideology. It comes down to education and geography as well.
Biden ended up winning states that Trump took 2016 in both the Great Lakes and Sun Belt. The way he did it in both regions was similar. He mostly built on Clinton’s success, rather than win back a lot of 2012 Barack Obama voters. In other words, this election wasn’t determined by those voters interviewed in all those diners after Trump won. They almost uniformly stuck with Trump. It was a different set of voters that won it for Biden.
Let’s start in the Great Lakes.
Biden’s margin over Trump relative to Clinton increased by about 120,000 votes in those six counties alone. His margin over Trump in the rest of the state went up by only about 50,000, despite these counties casting a lot more of the statewide vote.
The same held true to an even larger degree in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. There were six Pennsylvania counties where Clinton outperformed Obama. As in Michigan, they all had a larger share of college educated voters than the state as a whole.
Biden’s margin over Trump (relative to Clinton) increased by nearly 140,000 votes in these six counties alone. In the rest of the state, it was actually Trump’s margin that increased by nearly 15,000 over his 2016 performance.
Without maximizing Clinton’s overperformance of Obama, Biden would have lost his birth state.
Pretty much the same thing happened in Wisconsin. There were four counties where Clinton did better than Obama. As a group, they had a higher share of adults with college degrees than the country as a whole.
Biden expanded upon Clinton’s margin by about 65,000 votes in these four counties alone. In the rest of the state, Trump’s margin over Biden increased by a little more than 20,000 relative to where his margin was over Clinton in 2016.
Biden expands on Clinton gains to take Arizona and Georgia
Finally, the story in the Sun Belt was similar. Biden took Clinton’s successes and put them into overdrive.
The bottom line: Biden didn’t rewrite the map or pick apart Trump’s base. For the most part, he didn’t win back the areas that used to be Democratic. Biden’s winning map was a new one that further capitalized on Clinton’s gains in 2016.
