In election victory, Trump's gains went beyond the battlegrounds

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Trump returns to the White House, elected 47th president, Fox News projects

The Fox News Decision Desk projects former President Trump will win the 2024 presidential election with victory in Wisconsin.

President-elect Trump flipped six highly competitive states in his election victory last week — but his gains with voters were not limited to the battlegrounds.

Trump improved his vote share across the country, starting with conservative areas but extending into deeply Democratic states.

It is a critical part of the story of this election: one where Trump built a broader coalition and led on two defining issues of the campaign.

DONALD TRUMP ELECTED AS THE NEXT PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES

Trump gained in the battlegrounds and beyond, including traditionally Democratic areas

Trump gained in all seven of the battleground states. He gained 1.8 points in Michigan and Pennsylvania, 1.4 points in Georgia, just over a point in North Carolina, and under a point in Wisconsin.

(Trump’s largest gains are currently in Nevada and Arizona, two of 10 states where there is significant vote left to count.)

The 2024 presidential election was marked by broad swings in favor of President-elect Trump across the country, including pickups of several key counties. (Fox News)

But Trump’s best performances relative to 2020 were in reliably Democratic states. These states voted for Democrats, but by narrower margins than before.

His strongest improvement was in New York, where the former and future president gained 6.4 points. 

His county-level gains were spread across the state, but notably included an improvement in all five of the New York City boroughs (where, again, there are some votes left to be counted).

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He also posted a 5-point improvement in neighboring New Jersey, enough to reduce the margin of his loss to just 5.5 points. That is the best performance for a Republican candidate in more than three decades.

Look for New Jersey and Virginia (Trump +2.4 since 2020) to become a focal point in future elections, beginning with next year’s gubernatorial races.

Trump also took more vote share in Illinois (Trump +4.2 since 2020), another Democratic state with a highly populated urban area.

President-elect Trump made vast improvements over his 2020 numbers, particularly in urban areas and, most surprisingly, in reliably blue states. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

And as some pre-election polls predicted, the president-elect brought home another 5 points' worth of votes in Florida, where Democrats fought hard for a victory just two cycles ago.

Just as he improved in the battlegrounds and left-leaning states, he also put up strong gains in states like Texas, Tennessee, South Carolina and Idaho. Trump posted a 3-point improvement in all four of those conservative states, with smaller improvements in over a dozen more.

In fact, as of this writing, there isn’t a single state in the country where Trump turned in a weaker performance than he did four years ago.

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Harris’ gains limited to a handful of disparate areas

So far, Harris has only outperformed President Biden’s vote share in one state: Utah, where she gained 0.6 points since the last election.

But even in Utah, Trump also performed about a point better than he did in 2020. It is third-party candidates who saw the most erosion. (And there are many ballots left to count.)

To find positives for Harris, you have to search for a smattering of counties across the nation.

Suburban Atlanta was one of very few areas across the country where Vice President Kamala Harris improved on Democrats' 2020 numbers. (iStock)

The vice president did 2 to 9 points better in a few counties in the Georgia metropolitan area, led by Henry, Rockdale and Douglas.

She also improved in some of the North Carolina counties most impacted by Hurricane Helene, particularly Democratic-leaning Buncombe, but also Henderson and Transylvania. She posted about a 4-point gain in each.

Kaufman County, in the Dallas suburbs, also bucked the national trend. That Texas county swung about 6 points towards Harris.

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Harris posted a modest gain in Chaffee County, Colorado, otherwise known as the "Heart of the Rockies" (here, too, there are some outstanding ballots).

And there are signs that parts of Oregon and Washington could end up more Democratic than 2020 when counting is finished.

These are the exceptions to a clear rule: voters almost uniformly swung away from the Democrats this cycle.

Vice President Kamala Harris' candidacy saw a near-uniform swing away from Democrats by voters this cycle. (AP/Jacquelyn Martin)

Trump created a broader coalition and led on the top two issues

The Fox News Voter Analysis shows that Trump’s gains came from multiple groups, and that voters preferred him on two defining issues.

As the Polling Unit writes:

Trump’s victory was powered by his strength on the economy and immigration — two of voters’ top concerns. He was seen as a stronger leader than Harris in a time of turmoil, and voters remembered his presidency more fondly than their evaluations of the current administration. Trump ran up the score with his base while narrowing traditional Democratic advantages among Black, Hispanic and young voters.

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The complete Fox News Voter Analysis is available on foxnews.1eye.us.