A Massachusetts Yankee's Guide to the 2024 Election
More twists and turns than a roller coaster ride!
Table of Contents
Preamble
Results and Predictions
Presidential Results
My Accurate Predictions
My Inaccurate Predictions
Northeast Coverage
Massachusetts
Maine / Flag Update
New Hampshire
New York
New Jersey
Pennsylvania
The Rest of New England
Brief Everywhere Else Coverage
The South
The Midwest
The West
Fun Election Trivia
Preamble
I’m a flag-waving, patriotic nephew of my Uncle Sam, a rough-riding, fighting Yankee man, so I wanted to share with all my fellow Yankees a recap of the “Election to End All Elections”, as it were, and I’m gonna do it like a true Northeasterner: by giving way too much attention to our little old states and passive aggressively glossing over all the other ones.
And the 47th President is…
He’s done it folks, the Comeback Kid Donald Trump just Grover Cleveland-ed Kamala Harris. He did the impossible, not only winning a second, non-consecutive term, but he is also the only man known to have won an argument against a woman… twice! My lawyers have advised me to remind the reader that was, indeed, a joke.
And hey, would you look at that, we actually knew who the winner would be the night of (admittedly, it wasn’t called until after 1:00 AM, but still better than multiple days after). The fact that some states still haven’t finished counting two weeks later is completely unacceptable, but that’s for another time; we need to dissect this thing and see what I got right and what I got wrong.
Here is my prediction map from before the election, as well as the actual results. I’m also including a key so we’re all on the same page with the margins.
Safe: Win by 11%+
Likely: Win by 5-10%
Lean: Win by 3-4%
Tilt: Win by 0.1-2%
I Told You So!
Well, we can see my brilliance being attested to in my accurate predictions, including:
Trump wins AZ, GA, NC, PA, and WI.
Accurate margins of victory in swing(ey) states for Trump, including OH, IA, PA, WI, and NC, as well as Harris is VA, MN.
Trump wins the popular vote.
Republicans win Senate and Gubernatorial races in MT, OH, TX and NH.
Democrats win Senate and Gubernatorial races in AZ, NV, WI, MI, VA, MD and NC.
Well, I Can’t Be Expected to Know Everything…
In my pompous hubris and overestimation of the Vice President, I did get a number of predictions wrong, including:
Harris did not win MI or NV.
My margins of victory for Trump in FL, TX and AZ were far too small.
My margin of victory for Trump in GA was too high.
My margins of victory for Harris in NH, IL, NJ and NE-2 were too high.
Democrats did not win the Senate race in PA.
The Northeast
The most liberal region of the country, the Northeast (a.k.a. God’s country) nevertheless saw a massive rightward shift. While Trump only won Pennsylvania and Maine’s 2nd Congressional district, he did improve upon his 2020 margins in every state. Harris’ popular vote loss can be attributed to her failure to enthuse people in traditionally heavily Democratic states like Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey.
Massachusetts Election Fallout
Well Massachusetts, you once again surprise me with how the “highly educated” citizenry of our illustrious commonwealth voted. Fauxcahontas’ opponent Rick Harrison John Deaton managed to outpace Trump and put up the best fight ole’ Lizzie’s ever seen since Scott Brown back in 2012. Still, it wasn’t enough, and we are once again subjected to the sham septuagenarian shaman’s skulduggery.
But worse than that are the results of the ballot measures. Remember when I said last article that you can always rely on Masshole voters to pick the worst possible choices? Yeah, I was pretty spot on. Here’s how the state voted on each measure:
Authorize the State Auditor to Audit the Legislature: 71% Yes. Good job guys, you got one right. Now let’s see if our legendarily corrupt legislature will become any less so now that a light will be shined upon the sewer rats that infest it.
Remove the MCAS as a Graduation Requirement: 59% Yes. Yeah, let’s just get rid of the only academic standard we had left for our children. This is what happens when you let people who failed the MCAS vote.
Allow Ride Share Drivers to Unionize: 54% Yes. Man, the unions really do have this state by the balls. I don’t want to hear a goddamn peep from these morons when their Uber suddenly quadruples in price.
Legalize Psychedelic Substances: 57% No. Now this was surprising. I thought for sure the shitbums and stoners would come out in droves for this one, but I guess they were too high to find the polling place. Thank God.
Increase Minimum Wage of Tipped Employees: 64% No. Wow, another win for common sense and the workers! Unironically, good job folks. Tell the Californian who financed the Yes Vote campaign to go back to the land of fruits and nuts.
Finally, I wanted to share some really mind-boggling statistics. Every single county in Mass moved to the right, including Suffolk County, home to Boston, and that was by a whopping 12 points. Trump was 0.9 percentage points away from winning Bristol County, and mind you, no Republican has won a single county in Massachusetts since George H.W. Bush’s landslide victory in 1988. He managed to win in Fall River, goddamn Fall River, by 3 points. Do you know the last time a Republican won Fall River? It was back in 1924 when popular former Governor Calvin Coolidge won in a landslide. Overall, Harris underperformed Biden in the state by 8.5%.
Maine, Why?
For all of our Fun With Flags fans out there, the Maine-iacs up in the Pine Tree State decided to personally slight us by voting against restoring their older, better flag. You lobster trappers have no taste, but I suppose it is the will of the people to continue flying that bland banner. At least it’s one of the better SOBs.
As for election coverage in the state, things at the presidential level went about as expected, per my predictions. Trump won the largely rural 2nd District and lost both the more urban (and I mean urban in the sense that Maine’s biggest city, Portland has a population of 69,000) 1st District and the state-at-large by the margins I anticipated. The real race to watch was the House election for the 2nd District, where incumbent Democrat Jared Golden won in one of the closest races of the night against Republican challenger Austin Theriault by a margin of 0.69%, or 2,706 votes, in the second round of their ranked-choice vote, as no candidate cleared the 50% of the first round.
New Hampshire: Swing State No More?
The population of the Granite State has been growing considerably, mostly due to migration from Mass, and it has become more reliably Democratic since its last time voting Republican at the presidential level in 2004. Despite this leftward shift, Harris underperformed Biden by around 4%. Still, she did better than Clinton in 2016, which was the second closest election that year. While a close race, I do believe that the days of New Hampshire voting GOP at the national level are likely over for the foreseeable future. However, Kelly Ayotte managed to outrun Trump and handily won the governorship, even winning the two biggest cities of Nashua and Manchester (of which her opponent, Joyce Craig, was the Mayor. Yikes!)
New York: Trump Makes Gains in His Birth State
While Harris did win the state by a safe margin, she did so only barely with a 12% victory, and that’s a truly pathetic showing for a state that has traditionally voted for the Democrat by 20-30%. The most interesting developments in the Empire State came from NYC and its suburbs. Trump improved in the city proper by considerable margins, thanks to his increased support from minority groups, especially in the Bronx and Queens, his home borough. Here’s the breakdown by borough:
Manhattan: Harris 82%, Trump 18% (Trump +10 from 2020)
The Bronx: Harris 73%, Trump 27% (Trump +21 from 2020)
Brooklyn: Harris 72%, Trump 28% (Trump +11 from 2020)
Queens: Harris 62%, Trump 38% (Trump +21 from 2020)
Staten Island: Trump 65%, Harris 35% (Trump +15 from 2020)
He managed to outright flip both Long Island counties (Nassau and Suffolk), as well as suburban Rockland County (thanks to his winning of 45% of New York’s Jewish vote, largely to the Dems’ support of Hamas) He also improved in rich, liberal, suburban Westchester County by 10 points.
New Jersey: The Biggest Surprise of the Night
In what was possibly the most surprising result of the night, Harris only managed to win New Jersey, a Democrat stronghold typically won by an average of 15%, by 5.8%. Given the closeness of this election and the 2021 gubernatorial election, some analysts are beginning to wonder if New Jersey might be a swing state. Hell, it voted to the right of peripheral swing states like Maine and New Mexico. It was twice as close as the alleged swing states of Texas and Florida. I’m not sure I would go so far as to say that, but still, it is a mind-boggling sight to behold.
Pennsylvania: The State to Win
The mother of all swing states, Pennsylvania went to Trump by the largest margin of the former so-called “Blue Wall” states: roughly 2%. Interestingly, polls had PA as the closest of the Rust Belt swing states, but it appears they didn’t take into account Joe Biden’s unique point of strength there in 2020 when estimating Harris’ margins. Trump managed to take back Erie and Northampton Counties, both of which he lost to “Pennsylvania’s Third Senator” Scranton Joe in 2020, and he managed to flip suburban Monroe and Bucks Counties to the Republican column for the first time in decades.
Trump’s coattails were able to bring Dave McCormick over the top to secure a squeaker of a victory over the now former electoral juggernaut that is Bob Casey. This was probably the most surprising result of the night in terms of Senate races. I ain’t gonna lie: I didn’t think Mick or Mack could do it, but lo and behold, he pulled this victory out of his ass and knocked Bob Casey the Lesser off his throne.
Senator Casey, for his part, has refused to concede and is threatening our democracy with his election denialism. In a rather alarming development, the Democratic Bucks County Commissioners have voted to count a number of illegal ballots in order to help Casey. Not only have these commissioners flagrantly disregarded the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s ruling on what ballot should be accepted, but they are openly bragging about it. Remember kids, denying the results of an election and attempting to nakedly cheat and overturn it is only bad and a threat to democracy when Republicans do it! What a disgusting and shameful display.
Despite all of these actual attempts to undermine our democracy, it is highly unlikely Casey will keep his seat. Thanks to McCormick’s victory, the GOP will hold 53 Senate seats, an impressive win, but short of what many Republicans were hoping. Of the “Big 7” swing states this cycle, 5 had Senate elections, and this is the only one that the GOP won, showing that either vote-splitting is still a common enough occurrence or that the Republican candidates didn’t enthuse voters as much as Trump himself did, which should be a warning for Republicans’ future election prospects in a post-Trump era.
The Rest of the New England
Sorry Connecticut, nothing interesting really happened within your borders this time around. I hope you can at least find solace in the fact that no one was really all that interested in what happened there to begin with, so we can’t be disappointed.
As for our cheeky little sidekick Rhode Island, the only thing of note that happened was that Trump won the city of Woonsocket, the first Republican to do so since Reagan in 1984. Okay Rhode Island, you’ve had your annual mention, now shoo, go back to the basement.
Vermont remained the safest Democrat state for the second cycle in a row, but Harris did lose support from 2020, allowing for Orleans County to flip for the Republican candidate for the first time since 2000.
The South
North Carolina: I know what you are all wondering, so I’ll answer right away. No, the self-described “Black Nazi” did not win the governorship of North Carolina. He wasn’t even close, in fact, losing by almost 15% and underperforming Trump at the top of the ticket who won by 3%. Turns out reverse coattails aren’t a thing, like so many liberals hoped for.
Virginia: Trump managed to bring the margin down to 2016 levels of about 5% as opposed to 10% as it was in 2020. This was due to Harris’ shockingly bad underperformance in the NOVA counties of Loudoun, Fairfax and Prince William, which all shifted right by 7.5-9.5%. Also, Tim Kaine outpaced Harris in the Senate race and soundly defeated Hung Cao, leaving him hanging out to dry. Sorry, too soon.
Georgia: Trump managed to reclaim Georgia after his razor-thin loss in 2020. However, the Atlanta area is one of the only parts of the country where the vote share shifted leftward. While Republicans can do a victory lap now, they should not rest on their laurels so soon. Given how tight this election was, the GOP would be wise to not assume they have the Peach State in the proverbial basket going forward.
Florida: Well, the perennial swing state of Florida is no more, as it went to Trump by an astronomical 13%, and he flipped major urban counties like Pinellas and Hillsborough (Tampa Bay), Duval (Jacksonville) and Miami-Dade (Miami, no prizes for guessing that). Miami-Dade saw a 19 point shift from 2020 when it went to Biden by around 7% to now Trump by 11%. Must be all those white supremacist Cubans, Haitians, Hondurans, Guatemalans, Venezuelans…
Texas: Welp, so much for the “Blue Texas” cope. Trump won the Lone Star State by 14%, higher than his margins in both prior elections. He flipped back large urban counties like Tarrant (Fort Worth) and won nearly every single border county, which are all heavily Hispanic. Harris did win Harris County (home to Houston), but only by 5%, or 1/3 of what Biden managed. Oh, and Ted Cruz also easily won his reelection bid against whatshisname.
The Midwest
A Disappointing Night for Harris: Let’s flyover this section as quick as possible; Midwesterners are, frankly, Yankees who couldn’t cut it back East. Sorry, not sorry. Harris underperformed Biden everywhere, but of particular note are her 3 victories in the region: Nebraska’s 2nd District, Minnesota and Illinois. She fell short of expectations in all three, winning by 4%, 4% and 10%, respectively. To put that into perspective, Biden won each by 7%, 7% and 17%. Ouch. She even had Governor Tampon Tim on her ticket and still managed to do worse than Geriatric Joe in Mini Soda. Tragic.
A Great Night for Orange Man: Trump, for his part, outdid expectations and won what we can now safely call “the former swing states” of Iowa and Ohio by 13% and 11% each. And for those keeping score back home, the brown guy from Cleveland beat the guy from Cleveland named Brown to become the Buckeye State’s new senator. And since sitting Senator Vance will soon become VP, that means Ohio will have a fresh slate of Senators going into 2025 when his replacement is selected. How exciting!
The Swingers: Trump managed to wrangle up the Great Lakes states of Wisconsin and Michigan and add them to his column once again, though most surprising perhaps is that Michigan voted to the right of Wisconsin. Trump’s coattails were not long enough to drag his GOP underlings across the finish line in these two states’ senatorial elections, however. Both candidates fell short by under 1%. The GOP should be weary of their lackluster down ballot performances across the board.
The West
A Pretty Standard Result: Oh look, it’s the part of the country where they don’t know how to count! At least, I imagine that’s why it takes them fucking weeks to do something Florida can do in 2 hours, but I digress. At least most of these states are so partisan that waiting an eternity for results doesn’t typically mean much. Though, like everywhere else, Harris did not meet expectations, even in her home state of California where she is underperforming Biden by almost 10% . Of course, this could all change, as at time of writing, they’re still tallying results, somehow. As it stands now, she has won around 2.2 million less votes than Biden and has worse margins in San Diego, LA, Frisco, and even her home city of Oakland. Yikes!
New Mexico: Oh would you look at that, another traditionally safe Democratic state that Harris only managed to win by a likely margin of 6%! The New Jersey of the Southwest, we’ll call it. Piss poor showing there, Kamala.
Arizona: After his shocking defeat in 2020, we were told that a candidate like Trump could never win again in a state so infested with neocons as Arizona. A state of McCain and Cheney-ites could never be won by a populist; except it could, and by 6% too. Is Arizona no longer a swing state and indeed back firmly in Republican hands? Not so fast, you say, the Republicans did lose the Senate race, after all. Fair enough, but 1) it was still within 2% and 2) had they ran literally anyone else besides local nutjob Kari Lake, it wouldn’t have even been close. I wouldn’t hold your breath on her conceding though, she still hasn’t accepted her 2022 gubernatorial loss.
Nevada: This is why you never bet big in Vegas, kids. I thought T-Rump would lose Nevada, but he took home a solid victory of 3%, flipping it Republican for the first time in 20 years. Fuck! There goes my kid’s college fund that I bet on a Harris victory! Jokes aside, while he didn’t win either of the two counties where anyone actually lives, he brought the margins to under 2% or less in each one, giving him the victory. I can still recoup my losses with the Senate race, though, where my prediction that Sam Brown would lose to Jackie Rosen proved correct. Brown did perform much better than expected, so maybe he has a chance next time around. To misquote Casablanca, “play it again, Sam,” and you just might win!
Fun Election Trivia!
To end on a fun note, I wanted to share with you some of the looniest stats to come out of this election.
The longest one-party streak of any state belonged to Starr County in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas (the most Hispanic county in the US). It last voted Republican in 1892 when it voted against the only other President to win a non-consecutive term, Grover Cleveland. Trump won it with 58% of the vote, ending the 132-year streak.
Kamala Harris did not improve upon Biden’s margins by more than 3% in any of the 3,244 counties in the United States. Watch this hilarious video from CNN and listen to Jake Tapper’s reaction upon discovering this news.
One of the closest House elections this year is in Iowa’s 1st District. Incumbent Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks is up by 801 votes (0.19%), but her opponent has requested a recount. Should Triple M win with this tally, this will only be her second closest election victory, with her 2020 victory by 6 votes (0.002%) making this look like a landslide. Every vote counts!
The closest House race at time of writing (thanks California; it’s been 2 weeks and we’re still waiting) is in California’s 45th Congressional District in (mostly) Orange County, where incumbent Republican Michelle Steel is having the political fight of her life against Democratic challenger Derek Tran. With a reported 94% of the ballots in, Tran is up by 102 votes, or 0.03%.
Dearborn, Michigan, home to the largest Arab-American community in the US, was won by Trump, proving that even being staunchly pro-Israel is more appealing to Arab voters than being wishy-washy and noncommittal on the conflict.
The most partisan districts were Nebraska’s 3rd Congressional District, which Trump won by 54%, and Washington D.C., which Harris won by 86%. The most partisan states were Wyoming, which Trump won by 46%, and Vermont, which Harris won by 32%.
The closest state was Wisconsin, which Trump won by 0.86%.
Trump won the popular vote for the first time of his 3 runs. He is set to win by about 1.7%, or around 2.6 million votes at time of writing. He is the first Republican to win the popular vote since Bush did in 2004, and before that, Bush Sr. in 1988!
