The Lost Voters: Why Millions of Democratic Voters Who Stayed Home Propelled Trump To The White House

Detailed voting totals for the 2024 presidential election are now available. According to Cook Political Report data, a total of 154,734,028 votes were counted. Donald Trump received 49.86% of those votes, while Kamala Harris received 48.26%. Trump's sweeping victory shocked the nation, as renowned pollsters had predicted a much tighter race.

While many political observers have focused on uncovering the demographic data of voters that led Trump to a second term as President of the United States, others, such as political expert Dr. Jeremi Suri, are instead analyzing the 'why' behind Harris's overwhelming loss.

"The stories of some voters shifting to Trump, especially in Latino counties in Texas, are important, but they did not decide the election," Suri stated.

In his most recent political analysis, Suri credits the approximately four million "lost voters" who, in 2020, cast their ballots for Biden but, in the 2024 election, chose not to vote for either Trump or Harris. "The loss of these voters to either candidate is the real story of the election." According to the scholar, these "lost voters" blindsided the Democratic party, as many were counting on their collective power–which exceeded the 2.8 million votes that helped Trump win the popular vote–would make Harris the first female U.S. President.

"[Harris] clearly failed to reach millions of Americans who had voted Democratic before and should have voted that way again... voting is a very sticky habit and people rarely cross parties." Suri explained, adding that, "Elections in American history are decided by who does not vote. It was Democratic-leaning voters who chose to sit this one out, therefore electing Donald Trump."

In swing-state Michigan, which Trump won, Wayne County illustrates the "lost voter" phenomenon. Trump gained 24,307 votes in the county compared to 2020, while Harris lost 60,138 votes. Her loss was "more than double Trump's gain."

"This gap was repeated across Michigan, and it accounts for why Harris lost the state by about 80,000 votes – votes that did not go to Trump, but allowed him to win," Suri explained.

While the reasons why these four million voters chose not to make their voices heard probably vary, the political expert cited "economic frustration, concerns about the border, opposition to Biden and Harris' Middle East policies, and discomfort with an African-American and Asian-American woman as president," as possible explanations.

Suri profiled these voters as "working-class" people living paycheck to paycheck who are probably fearful of higher taxes, and not that beneficiated by minimum wage raises.

"These are urban voters in Detroit, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, Las Vegas, and elsewhere who need to feel validated in their economic struggles and hopeful that a candidate will really try to help them," he explained.

Non-voting Americans have long drawn the attention of political observers, as the United States is one of the world's most established democracies yet has one of the lowest rates of participation among eligible voters.

While both Republican and Democratic campaigns spent millions of dollars urging their supporters to use their votes to "save" the nation, preliminary election data from the University of Florida Election Lab indicates that about 155 million ballots were cast, meaning an estimated 89 million Americans, or about 36% of the country's voting-eligible population, did not vote in the 2024 general election. That number is greater than the number of people who voted for either Trump or Harris and very similar to the non-voter totals reported for the 2020 election.