The charts that show how Harris underperformed Biden across the country

Donald Trump improves vote share in nearly every state as vice-president fails to consolidate gains made by Democratic nominee in 2020

Donald Trump has won the US presidency with a sweeping set of victories across a number of key battleground states.
The president-elect increased his vote share across nearly every state while Kamala Harris watched the votes won by Joe Biden in 2020 disappear and go to her rival.
Ms Harris improved on Mr Biden’s 2020 vote share in just two states, Maine and Washington, dramatically underperforming the outgoing president.
In 2020, Mr Biden managed to increase his party’s vote share in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
But as Ms Harris suffered the fatal blow of failing to win over more minority and female voters than Mr Biden, Trump bumped up his own support across 41 states compared to his 2020 performance, making a major bounceback.
Trump’s biggest increases were recorded in blue states that ultimately went to Ms Harris.
Illinois, home to Chicago, saw Trump obtain 47 per cent of the vote this year, shooting up from 40 per cent in 2020. Even in the Democrats’ stronghold of New York, the Republican vote share leapt from 37 to 44 per cent.
In most states, he exceeded his 2020 take by more than a percentage point, often enough to tip a swing state in his favour.
Ms Harris’s shortcomings in the 2024 race were evident all the way down to county level, with the vice-president failing to come close to the levels of support that ultimately propelled Mr Biden to the White House.
In 2020, the average vote share in counties won by Mr Biden was 60.6 per cent – a comfortable win. In 2024, that had gone down slightly to 59.8 per cent.
Across 3,100 counties across mainland USA, Ms Harris increased her vote share by more than three points in just 24.
This suggests Trump succeeded in a primary goal: chipping away at Ms Harris’s winning margins.
Trump’s average vote share in blue counties won by both Mr Biden in 2020 and by Ms Harris in 2024 increased from 37.3 to 38.2 per cent.
And across the US, whether counties turned out a blue or red vote overall, Trump managed to increase his average county vote share from 64.7 to 66.9 per cent.
Nowhere was this more apparent than in the critical battleground state of Pennsylvania. Of all the swing states, it carries the most electoral college votes, and no Democratic candidate has won the White House without it since 1948.
Harris obtained 48.2 per cent of the vote in Pennsylvania compared to Trump’s 50.7 per cent. She performed notably badly in the state’s two bellwether counties: Erie and Northampton, which both have a track record of backing whoever ultimately takes office.
It has been said that to appeal to the average Pennsylvanian, a candidate should endeavour to appeal to the average Eerian or Northamptonian.
Mr Biden won both counties in 2020, but Trump took them back on Tuesday with even larger margins. Under Ms Harris, the Democratic vote share decreased by 1.2 points in Erie and by 1.4 points in Northampton.
Abortion rights, the issue which the Harris campaign was widely acknowledged to be strongest on, was not the decisive factor at the ballot box.
Although 21 per cent of Harris voters considered abortion the most important issue on the line, just 14 per cent of the public overall agreed.
After four years of soaring living costs and inflation, the state of the economy was a greater cause for concern for the average American.
It means Ms Harris failed to increase her vote share among women for the Democrats despite her strong stance on women’s healthcare and abortion access.
Exit poll data showed 55 per cent of women voted for her – identical to Biden’s proportion of the female vote in 2020, according to Pew Research Center – compared with 44 per cent who voted for Trump, a two point gain.
Ms Harris did make inroads with wealthy, educated, white women, however. Her support was strongest of all among Gen Z women, 62 per cent of whom said they would vote for her.
But it was not enough to counterbalance Trump’s surge in popularity with Latino voters.
The exit poll showed Trump up 13 points among Latinos compared to when he ran against Biden.
Where Hispanic and Latino communities were dominant, Mr Biden took an average of 32.4 per cent of the vote in 2020. That has dropped to 29 per cent under Ms Harris – 40 points behind Trump.
Although Ms Harris performed better with black voters than her rival, her winning margins trail Mr Biden’s four years earlier.
Ms Harris’s average vote share in largely black counties, where between 40 and 60 per cent of the population identified as African American, decreased from 54.2 to 51.8 per cent.
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