What happened?

 In 2016, Donald Trump got about 46% of the vote.  In 2020, he got around 47% (47.7% according to the last figures I saw, but it will go down as California gets around to counting its ballots).  So hardly any change in overall support for Trump (although voters turnout was higher this time)--but has there been any change in who voted for him?  There's been a lot of attention to his increased support among non-white voters:  for example, Andrew Sullivan said "the GOP got the highest proportion of the minority vote since 1960!"  But I haven't seen any systematic comparison of changes in support among different groups, so I'll give one here, based on the Edison exit polls:

Republican Vote, 2016-2020

 

                                        2016               2020            Change
Men                             52%                     49%           -3     

Women                       41%                     43%           +2

GAP                              11                         6

White                            57%                    57%           0

Black                            8%                      12%            +4
Latino/a                      28%                   32%           +4
Asian-Am.                  27%                     31%            +4

GAP (B/W)                 49                        45    

GAP (L/W)                29                        25    

White Men                 62%                     58%           -4
White Women           52%                     55%           +3
Black Men                   13%                     18%           +5%

Black Women            4%                       8%             +4%

Latino                        32%                     36%           +4%

Latina                         25%                     28%           +3%

 

Age 18-29                   36%                     35%           -1%

        30-44                   52%                     55%           +3%

        45-65                   52%                     49%           -3%

        65+                       52%                     51%            -1%

GAP(Y/O)                   16                         16

 

Urban                          34%                     37%           +3%

Suburban                    49%                     48%           -1%

Rural                            61%                     54%           -7%

GAP (U/R)                 27                        17              

 

 

                                        2016               2020            Change
White Coll.                 48%                    49%           +1%
White non-C              66%                     64%           -2%
Non-W coll                22%                     27%           +5%
Non-W non-coll       20%                     26%           +6%
GAP (White)              18                        15

under $50,000         41%                     42%           +1%  
    $50K-49,999         49%                     43%           -6%
    $100,000+             47%                     54%           +7%
GAP (LO/HI)             6                          12

 

LGBT                           14%                     28%           +14%

Not LGBT                   47%                     48%           +1%
GAP                              33                        20

Veterans                     60%                    52%           -8%        
non-Vets                     44%                     46%           +2%

GAP                             16                         6

 

W. Evangelical           80%                    76%           -4%

All others                    34%                     37%           +3

GAP                              46                        39 

I highlight the ones for which the gap changed by more than five percentage points.

On race and ethnicity, Trump did improve among both blacks and Latinos, but not by much--the black/white and Latino/white gaps are still very large.  You could say that the increase among blacks--from 8% to 12%--is big in relative terms, but 12% isn't out of line with recent Republican performances--in 2004, George Bush got 11% of the black vote (and 44% of the Latino vote).  So Sullivan's statement about it being the highest Republican support among racial minorities since 1960 is either misleading or simply wrong. 

I can think of plausible explanations for two of the changes.  In 2016, there were almost no differences by income--in 2020, there was a small but clear tendency for the Trump vote to increase with income.  I would guess that this is because in 2016 there were some doubts about his economic policy, but as president he's followed a traditional Republican approach.  The decline in support among evangelicals might be a reaction against his personal conduct--in 2016, you could believe that he would "grow into the office," but by 2020 it's clear that he is what he is.   The other changes are puzzling--I can't think of a good reason why the urban/rural, LGBT/straight, or veteran/non-veteran gaps would decline.  In fact, I would have guessed that the urban/rural and veteran/non-veteran gaps would increase, since his policies and rhetoric favored the military and disfavored cities.  Of course, these figures affected by sampling error, and some of them are crudely measured, so they could be illusory.  Still, there's clearly a lot for social scientists to think about.