US election: How big a win was this for Donald Trump?
“America has given us an unprecedented and powerful mandate. It was a historic realignment. Uniting citizens of all backgrounds around a common core of common sense.”
Never knowingly understated, those were some of the words of Donald Trump as he proclaimed victory early on Wednesday morning.
Unlike some of his claims following the 2020 election, much of the statement above is supported by data.
President-elect Trump increased his vote share in 90% of US counties, compared with 2020, and became just the second Republican since 1988 to win the popular vote.
He also increased his vote significantly among many demographic groups which had been least likely to back him in the past.
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There’s still counting to do, not least in battleground Arizona, but now the result is clear, where does his victory rank in history, and how much of a mandate does he really have from the American people?
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How big was the win?
Kamala Harris would have won if she had persuaded 123,750 people in the right proportions in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan to vote for her instead of Trump.
That sounds like a big number, but it’s less than 0.1% of the 140 million-plus people that cast votes in the election, and less than 1% of the voters in those three key states.
Presidential elections often tend to be even closer than this, however. Trump’s win this year is the clearest one this century that wasn’t achieved by president Barack Obama.
How big were the gains?
Trump made improvements almost everywhere, but he may still end up on fewer total votes than he won last time.
Despite the warnings of what was at stake at this election, it looks like the final number of people to cast a ballot will be lower than in 2020.
The Democrat vote is down around 10 million, while Trump’s vote appears relatively similar to last time, despite a growing population.
In terms of share of the vote, however, he increased his in more counties than any other candidate since at least 2004, and he recorded the highest Republican vote share this century in more than two-thirds of counties across America.
Most of those improvements weren’t by much, however. Just 120 out of the 2,800 counties recorded an improvement of more than five points – the lowest number by a winning president this century other than Joe Biden.
That’s reflected if you look at the number of counties he flipped from being majority Democrat to majority Republican – 95 counties so far. That number was also the lowest this century, other than that achieved by Biden and less than half of what Trump flipped in 2016, perhaps a sign of the recent partisanship in US politics.
What about the type of people backing him?
This tells a similar story.
President-elect Trump gained ground among most voter groups. The biggest increase in support was among Latinos (up from around a third to just under half) and younger voters (up from around a third to two-fifths) who were key to securing his win.
A smaller increase of eight points was enough for him to win majority support among people earning less than $50,000, who had backed every Democrat since Bill Clinton. And crucially, he narrowly took back the suburbs, where American elections are so often won or lost.
Those marginal gains across different groups helped Trump to win the key battlegrounds and go some way to broadening his coalition of voters, making it more representative of the average American.
The youngest voters, oldest voters, lowest-earning voters and Latinos all voted significantly closer to the US average than they have done in other recent elections. So, while they might not necessarily be “for” the president-elect as a whole, they were willing to vote for him.
While black voters and voters who didn’t go to college also moved further towards Trump, these two groups still differ significantly from the average in this election. There also remains a clear education divide with college-educated people much more likely to vote Democrat.
The Democratic decline
While much of the story so far is about a small but united shift in support, there were also some really historic and surprising results, particularly in the big cities.
In New York, Chicago, Detroit and Las Vegas, Trump earned a higher vote share than any other Republican since George HW Bush in 1988.
He still lost overall in the counties that include those cities, but once more it was a story of progress, whether it was down to who turned out or increased support.
But there were previous Democratic strongholds that did turn Republican, including parts of Florida like the formerly true-blue Miami-Dade, which has the second-largest Latino voting age population in America and backed Hillary Clinton by a margin of almost 2:1 in 2016.
Its one million-plus voters backed a Republican for the first time since 1988, and president-elect Trump got the highest Republican vote share there since Ronald Reagan’s 1984 landslide.
He also returned Pinellas to the Republican column and made significant gains in other big population centres like Broward and Palm Beach Counties.
The turnaround of US politics since Trump shook it all up in 2016 means there are now only two counties, out of more than 3,000, that have voted for the winning candidate at every election since 2000.
Those are Blaine County, Montana, an agricultural area up on the Canadian border, and Essex County, a mountainous part of upstate New York, bordering Vermont.
Essex-man was a key part of some of Tony Blair’s big electoral wins at the turn of the millennium. Perhaps a different Essex-man rises again, this time to define America, as it moves towards the next period of its history.
The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.
The unsolved killing of a six-year-old beauty pageant queen is still a priority for investigators, police have insisted.
JonBenet Ramsey was found beaten and strangled in the basement of her family home in Colorado in 1996, a case revisited in a three-part Netflix series.
Her killer has never been found, and the police department for the city of Boulder refused to answer questions on Monday about any tips they’re investigating.
“It’s obvious that the Boulder Police Department wants to solve this case and the only reason is to bring justice to the victim,” they told Sky’s US partner network NBC News.
The force instead referred to a video statement shared by police chief Steve Redfearn, in which he said officers “would love nothing more than to bring justice to her memory”.
Police outside the home in January 1997. Pic: AP
That statement was made on the day after Netflix released Cold Case: Who Killed JonBenet Ramset, which has renewed interest in the killing that made global headlines.
JonBenet was found on Boxing Day several hours after her mother Patsy called police about a ransom note that had been left behind.
The girl’s father John found her that afternoon and carried her upstairs, ruining the integrity of the crime scene and sparking criticism of the police force’s handling of the case.
Details of the crime and footage of JonBenet competing in pageants propelled the case into one of the highest-profile mysteries in the US.
John and Patsy Ramsey, the girl’s parents, pictured in 2000. Pic: AP
“There are a number of things that people have pointed to throughout the years that could have been done better, and we acknowledge that is true,” Mr Redfearn said last week.
“However, it is important to emphasise that while we cannot go back to that horrible day in 1996, our goal is to find JonBenet Ramsey’s killer.
“Our commitment to that has never wavered.”
While the girl’s family lived under a cloud of suspicion for years, prosecutors apologised to her parents and brother in 2008 and cleared them of any involvement.
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The Netflix series doesn’t point the finger at anyone, but does highlight her father’s hope new DNA testing might solve the case.
JonBenet’s mother died of cancer in 2006 aged 49.
US
Missing woman ‘disappeared voluntarily’, police say – after dad took own life when he failed to find her
A missing woman, whose dad took his own life after failing to find her, disappeared voluntarily, police have said.
Hannah Kobayashi, 30, missed a connecting flight from Hawaii to New York in Los Angeles on 8 November and vanished days later after sending “alarming” texts to her family.
Her father Ryan retraced her footsteps with relatives and volunteers, but was found dead in a car park near a Los Angeles airport on 24 November.
Overnight, police said Hannah wanted to “step away from modern connectivity” and was last seen crossing into Mexico with her luggage.
Los Angeles police chief Jim McDonnell said there was no evidence Hannah was trafficked or a victim of a crime and classified her disappearance as a “voluntary missing person”.
“We’ve basically done everything we can do at this point. She’s left the country and is in another nation now,” he said, adding she has a right to privacy but should contact her family.
“A simple message could reassure those who care about her.”
The case will remain active until her safety is confirmed and they will be notified if she returns to the US, he said.
Pic: Missing Persons of America
Hannah had been seen around Los Angeles, police said, and had asked or her luggage to be sent back to her from New York – picking it up from the airport on 11 November and leaving without her phone.
Investigators found she “expressed the desire to step away from modern connectivity”.
Officers have questioned a man Hannah was seen with on a train, describing him as “cooperative”.
Last week, detectives determined Hannah missed her connecting flight intentionally, though her sister, Sydni, disputed his statement in a social media post.
CCTV images reviewed by police showed her walking alone and unharmed through a tunnel in San Ysidro, 125 miles southwest of Los Angeles, at midday on 12 November.
Ryan Kobayashi. Pic: PA
It comes after Hannah’s family said they started to receive “strange and cryptic, just alarming” texts from her before she disappeared.
These messages referenced her being “intercepted” as she got on a train and being scared someone was trying to steal her identity.
Her aunt Larie Pidgeon said “she went dark” once the family “started pressing”.
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Sky News US partner network NBC News reported one of the texts received by Hannah’s family read: “I got tricked pretty much into giving away all my funds for someone I thought I loved.”
Shortly after the message was sent, her father flew out to Los Angeles from Hawaii to search for her for 13 days.
The family said his loss ” compounded the family’s suffering immeasurably”.
Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK.
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