Which demographic holds the key to the White House in 2024? Will black voters who have abandoned Biden deliver a victory for Trump? It certainly won't hurt. But, according to a recent Cygnal poll conducted earlier this month, one demographic that may actually decide this election is an "emerging" group they identified that makes up 18% of the electorate. Cygnal found that this group may "hold the keys to the White House and Congress."
However, they present "both an opportunity and a challenge for Republicans."
"This latest national poll shows a new key voter group emerging. They are young, ticked-off, diverse, working-class, and trending toward Republicans. These voters also skew more female, tend to be younger than 45, and a majority voted for Trump in 2020," says Cygnal pollster Mitch Brown. "Despite aligning well with the GOP base, these voters are more moderate and slightly more likely to view the Republican Party as more extreme. And while both Trump and Biden are underwater, with Trump just a tad more than Biden, the main difference is that this group is much more inflation focused. At the same time, illegal immigration and tertiary issues like healthcare are distant priorities."
Brown's analysis of the latest national poll provides several other noteworthy findings. The top concerns for voters are inflation and the economy, with 27% prioritizing the economy and 25% highlighting illegal immigration. Republican voters drive concerns about illegal immigration, while independents focus more on economic issues and Democratic voters exhibit a broader range of concerns. Notably, 91% of voters expressed concern about the impact of inflation on their households, particularly younger women, Republicans, and parents. A mere 6.5% of voters named abortion as a top priority.
Related: Trump Seeks Support from Another Reliably Democrat Voting Bloc
According to Brown, "This is both an opportunity and a challenge for Republicans. They will need to speak to those top issues while not appearing extreme on fronts that don’t appeal to those issues if they want to maintain the advantage with 18 percent of the electorate that could swing the outcome of the election.”
Trump maintains strong support among Republicans, with 93% indicating they will vote for him. Additionally, he retains significant backing from his 2020 voters, with 92% committed to voting for him again. In contrast, Biden garners support from 91% of fellow Democrats and 88% of his 2020 voters—a significant disparity that could be pivotal in what is expected to be a close election
Helping Trump, of course, is that the key issues that are motivating voters work to his advantage. Concerns about illegal immigration and border security among Hispanics have risen to 25%, up from 20% the previous month, closely trailing concerns about inflation and the economy. On the presidential ballot, Trump maintains a steady lead of +3 over Biden, with Trump at 42%, Biden at 39%, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at 9%. Among independents, Trump leads with 31%, followed by Biden at 29%. Even with Kennedy presented as a Libertarian candidate—which he isn't—his overall support remains unchanged, with 8% of voters still undecided, and Kennedy's support losing a point.
