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Backroads Ballots: Election 2024 by the Numbers [1]

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Date: 2024-11-21

The Associated Press called the presidential election in favor of former president Donald Trump at 5:34 am on November 6th, the morning after Election Day. But even before that, political pundits and TV reporters had plenty to say about rural voters and their role in re-electing Trump.

Now that the numbers are in, host Olivia Weeks examines these assertions in the latest episode of Backroad Ballots, and takes a closer look at what happened on November 5th.

In this bonus episode, Weeks talks with Tim Marema, the editor-in-chief of the Daily Yonder, and Sarah Melotte, the Daily Yonder’s data correspondent. Their conversation focuses on high-level election results and the rural voter’s role in deciding the outcomes of the presidential race and state-wide ballot measures.

You can read some excerpted highlights below, and listen to the full conversation on spotify, apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to audio products.

Excerpts have been edited for length and clarity

Top-Line Results and Rural Voters in Swing States

A Daily Yonder Analysis shows that Trump’s victory was not caused by a surge of Republican rural voters, but instead by a sharp drop in Democratic turnout in major cities and their suburbs.

Tim Marema, editor-in-chief of the Daily Yonder, on voter turnout in 2024:

The main story is Trump held relatively close or exceeded his 2020 turnout, whereas Harris lost in every category of county across the board but especially in major metropolitan areas. Places like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, Detroit and Grand Rapids, Michigan, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Atlanta, Georgia. Those swing state major metro areas just kind of collapsed in turnout for the Democratic candidate.

The Daily Yonder has also reported on the rural margins in swing states, and how they did, or didn’t, affect the race.

Sarah Melotte, Daily Yonder data reporter, on rural voters in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin:

Pennsylvania as an example of where Harris was cost the election because of [lower] turnout in major cities in their suburbs, in places like the suburbs of Philadelphia. But in Wisconsin, rural voters made up a much larger share of Trump’s voter base than in Pennsylvania and many of the other swing states. And here in Wisconsin, rural voters shifted to Trump by a little over a percentage point. We found that the drop in turnout for Harris and the increased turnout for Trump – the margin largely happened in rural counties.

State-Wide Ballot Measures

One notable outcome of the election is that many left-leaning ballot measures such as those protecting the right to an abortion or opposing school choice received more support than Democratic candidate Vice President Kamala Harris. And according to Melotte, that margin was widest in rural counties:

There were more people in rural areas who voted for Trump, but then also voted no to school choice. I can take a guess that it’s because rural people know that public education is a huge part of the community’s economy and so the stakes are higher in rural.

For Marema, these divided votes give important insight to the limitations of our two-party system.

I think to some extent it’s a measurement of how the binary two-party system is an interference with people really getting what they want from their government. You know, these ballot initiatives show us that people would prefer to have a more subtle conversation about these issues than we’re able to have at the federal level in a two-party system.

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[1] Url: https://dailyyonder.com/backroads-ballots-election-2024-by-the-numbers/2024/11/21/

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