Polling shows President Joe Biden has a growing problem with retaining the support of black and Hispanic voters with the 2024 election just one year away.
The recent polling highlights the Democrat party’s divisions on how to address the invasion on the southern border and soaring inner city crime. “Even Biden’s administration is divided,” top officials told Axios about the crime and migration crises.
Immigrants walk along the U.S.-Mexico border barrier on December 30, 2022, in Yuma, Arizona (Photo by Qian Weizhong/VCG via Getty Images).
A thief attempts to break into a vehicle (Stock photo via Getty).
Throughout 2023, Joe Biden underperformed among nonwhite voters, New York Times/Siena College polling found. The latest poll published Sunday showed the president’s support among nonwhite voters sunk 33 points compared to 2020 election results [emphasis added]:
- Only 72 percent of black voters support Biden, along with only 47 percent of Hispanic voters.
- “The more diverse a state, the worse Biden does,” Axios reported on the polling [emphasis added].
- “Biden’s lead among Hispanics is in single digits in the six swing states polled (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin),” Axios reported [emphasis added]. “Democrats typically win among Hispanics by 30+ points.”
- Democrats lost ground among black and Hispanic voters in nearly every election in the last ten years.
- Biden is in a worse position among nonwhite voters since Walter Mondale in 1984.
Drilling down on the numbers, Nate Cohn, the New York Times’ chief political analyst, observed the rapid decline of Joe Biden’s support among nonwhite voters and how former President Donald Trump could benefit from desertions:
Overall, Mr. Biden leads by 81-8 among Black voters who turned out in 2022, but by just 62-14 among those who skipped the midterm elections. Similarly, he leads by 53-33 among Hispanics who voted in the midterms, compared with just a 42-37 lead among those who did not vote.
The survey finds evidence that a modest but important 5 percent of nonwhite Biden voters now support Mr. Trump, including 8 percent of Hispanic voters who say they backed Mr. Biden in 2020.
Beyond voters who have flipped to Mr. Trump, a large number of disaffected voters who supported Mr. Biden in 2020 now say they’re undecided or simply won’t vote this time around. As a consequence, his weakness is concentrated among less engaged voters on the periphery of politics, who have not consistently voted in recent elections and who may decide to stay home next November.
The polling worries many Democrats. Others question if Biden should be the Democrat’s 2024 nominee.
“Only @JoeBiden can make this decision. If he continues to run, he will be the nominee of the Democratic Party. What he needs to decide is whether that is wise; whether it’s in HIS best interest or the country’s?” David Axelrod posted on X.
Political analyst David Axelrod (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
“In uncertain times — globally, on the economy … Democrats by nature are a little bit skittish,” Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) told CNN. “They get themselves worried. They work themselves up. They talk in their groups, amongst one another — just stop it.”
Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.
