Election Impact: Election Margins Matter
November 2024
Winning and losing are probably the two most important components of each election, but the margins matter as well.
At the presidential level, former President Donald Trump is poised to be the first Republican to finish ahead in the national popular vote since President George W. Bush in his 2004 re-election. Even though that winning margin over Vice President Kamala Harris is likely to be less than 2 points, and his overall percentage likely to be less than a majority, it’s a winning margin, nonetheless.
Running up the score in Republican states including Texas and narrowing his losing margins in Democratic states including New York, Illinois, New Jersey and California, helped him achieve the elusive popular vote win that has annoyed him since his 2016 Electoral College victory.
Trump narrowing his losing margins among a range of demographic groups also propelled him to victory. Losing by less among 18- to 29-year-olds, Latino voters, Asian voters, women, union households, as well as turning Catholic voters and voters making less than $100,000 from losses to wins, was critical in helping him win the Electoral College and finish ahead in the popular vote.
But winning and losing margins didn’t only matter to Trump, they had an impact on races down the ballot.
Senate Margins
No one expected Harris to win Texas, but Trump’s winning margin helped save GOP Sen. Ted Cruz. If Harris could have replicated Biden’s 5.58-point loss in 2020, Democratic Rep. Colin Allred would have been on the cusp of knocking off the senator. Allred out-performed Harris by 5.19 points on the losing margin this year, but Trump ended up winning the Lone Star State by nearly 14 points and the Senate race wasn’t particularly close either.
In Ohio, Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown warned that he needed Harris to keep the presidential race within 7 points at the top of the ticket for him to win again. Trump ended up winning the Buckeye State by 11 points and GOP Senate nominee Bernie Moreno won by 4 points.
Trump’s surprisingly large 5.5-point win in Arizona was nearly enough to pull flawed Senate nominee Kari Lake across the finish line. But Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego prevailed by 2.4 points.
Those are just a few of the states, but the overall margin in the fight for control of the Senate was significant as well. Republicans not only gained control of the Senate, as expected, but their four-seat gain gives them some breathing room for the future.
Typically, midterm elections don’t go well for the president’s party, but a 53-seat to 47-seat majority could be enough to inoculate Republicans from a troublesome 2026. Maine is the only state that Harris won in 2024 that Republicans will be defending on the 2026 Senate map, and Sen. Susan Collins will be a tough out. Then the races get decidedly more difficult, including special elections in Ohio and Florida as well as North Carolina, Texas, and Alaska.
In short, Republicans’ margin in the Senate in 2024 mattered.
House Margins
Individual and overall margins in the House mattered as well.
Plenty of ink was spilled about the Democratic path to the House majority going through New York and California. And Democrats largely did what they needed to do in those two blue states.
Democrats needed to gain four seats overall for a House majority and they look likely to gain three in New York and at least two in California (with a couple races still uncalled by the Associated Press).
But Harris’ losses in Pennsylvania might have been the difference maker. Had she done better in a trio of districts at the top of the ballot, Democratic Reps. Susan Wild and Matt Cartwright probably would have survived in the 7th and 8th respectively, and Democrat Janelle Stelson might have knocked off GOP Rep. Scott Perry in the 10th. Those three wins could have been the difference between Speaker Mike Johnson and Speaker Hakeem Jeffries.
But despite Trump’s strength and Harris’ disappointment at the top of the ticket, House Democrats are set up well for 2026. Depending on the final outcome of a handful of uncalled races, Democrats will likely need a net gain of three or four seats to gain the majority two years from now. The president’s party has lost at least three seats in 23 of the last 26 midterm elections going back 100 years.
Even though all the ballots haven’t been counted, Democrats could be the early favorites to win the House in 2026 because of the close margin in 2024.
Nathan L. Gonzales is a senior political analyst for the Public Affairs Council and editor of Inside Elections, a nonpartisan newsletter with a subscription package designed to boost PACs with a regular newsletter and exclusive conference call. You can also hear more on the Inside Elections Podcast. His email address is [email protected].
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But winning and losing margins didn’t only matter to Trump, they had an impact on races down the ballot.
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