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September 19, 2024 - 8:30pm
On Wednesday, the Teamsters Union announced that, for the first time since 1996, they would be withholding an endorsement in the race for president. The news, while not entirely unexpected, still stung for Kamala Harris and her campaign. And it’s the latest sign of the Democratic Party’s struggles to retain union — and working-class — voters.
Historically, voters who belong to labour unions have been a reliably Democratic-leaning group. However, the party has lost ground with them in recent elections, which was likely a major factor in Hillary Clinton’s 2016 defeat. This has happened as many rank-and-file members, who tend to be more culturally conservative than union leadership, have begun drifting toward Republicans, including Trump. And this is likely what prompted the Teamsters, who have not backed a Republican nominee since 1988, to ultimately sit this election out. The union’s internal data showed that their members favoured Donald Trump over Harris by more than 20 points.
It’s important to note that Democrats’ attrition with union voters may not be uniform across all demographic groups. For instance, the Teamsters’ black caucus endorsed Harris over a month ago. Meanwhile, polling data from the Survey Center on American Life has found that the gap between Democratic and Republican support among white union members, specifically, has steadily narrowed over several decades, going from a clear Democratic advantage 30 years ago to evenly splitting their vote in 2020.
Still, the Teamsters members’ support for Trump is yet another symptom of a broader problem for Democrats with working-class voters. After Barack Obama won the working class by eight points in 2008, his margin slightly declined to four points when he won re-election. Then, in 2016, they backed Trump by six, a full 10-point Rightward shift. Among the white working class, the movement has been even stronger: they went from backing John McCain by nine points to supporting Mitt Romney by 20 to supporting Trump by an astounding 34 points. (Biden won back a sliver of this group in 2020, but they still backed Trump by 30).
Of course, the Democrats have tried to offset these losses by making gains among college-educated voters. But their continued decline with the working class poses serious risks over the long term — and possibly even this year. The latest polling averages show non-college voters backing Trump over Harris by 11.7 points, constituting a 5.7-point swing in his direction. Moreover, in 2020, they made up nearly 60% of the electorate, and the white non-college share was a 44% plurality. These voters are also overrepresented in key swing states, including the party’s Blue Wall (Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) as well as Nevada — a demonstration of just how pivotal they will be.
Some may look at this data and wonder why these voters, especially union members, are slipping away from Democrats. On policy, Democrats have delivered much more for workers than the Republicans have. But union members and the working class more broadly are also more culturally conservative than the party’s ascendant college base, which seems to be the sticking point for many of them. And if Democratic candidates don’t figure out a way to address that gap, it may raise a threat to their electoral viability.
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SubscribeThe “college educated” vote is distorted by a spiraling number of Forever Students. They’re getting useless bachelor degrees that require supplemental graduate studies throwing them into insurmountable debt…which they expect to be waived by the same people encouraging the nihilistic life path of forever studies.
Slightly left financially, slightly right culturally. That’s the electoral sweet spot!