NBC's Kornacki: Major Shift Towards Trump In "Latino Belt Of Pennsylvania"
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Sunday on "Meet The Press," NBC elections analyst Steve Kornacki ran down some of the voter registration data and demographic polling in Pennsylvania that sounds like pretty good news for the Trump campaign.
"Some people call this the Latino belt of Pennsylvania. These are counties that have some small to mid-sized cities with rapidly growing Latino populations. And we've been talking about Trump improving, relative to 2020 and 2016, among Hispanic voters. Well, you can see it," he said about the Reading-Allentown area of Eastern Pennsylvania.
"Reading, Pennsylvania is 70% Latino. It was overwhelmingly Democratic in 2020, Joe Biden won by 45 points. But look, that's down almost 20 points from 2012. Hazelton, Pennsylvania, is more than 60% Hispanic. In 2012, Democrats won it narrowly, it's now a double-digit Trump place. Allentown has come down 10 points in its margin for Democrats."
STEVE KORNACKI: Yeah, Kristen, let's start big picture nationally, here. We've been tracking this week to week, the average of all of the major national polls. Kamala Harris continuing with that three point advantage in the average over Donald Trump. But of course, Donald Trump lost the popular vote in each of the last two times he ran for president, and one of those times, in 2016, he was still able to win through the electoral college.
So, let's take a closer look, then, at the states, at the seven core battleground states. Again, you're looking at our poll averages in here. The headline, obviously, continues to be: it's very close everywhere. But one thing to draw your attention to when you talk about Trump being in Pennsylvania, Obama coming in there, all of the attention: From Trump's standpoint, in terms of an efficient path to 270 electoral votes, it would look something like this. If Trump gets Georgia, okay – where he leads in the poll average by a point and a half – if he gets North Carolina, where he is literally tied in the polls right now, and where Trump won in 2020 – the only one of these battleground states Trump carried four years ago – then all Trump would need, on top of Georgia and North Carolina, would be Pennsylvania, where Harris does have a small lead in the averages now. But Trump getting those three would get him to 270. So, that's the importance for him and for Democrats, the importance of blocking that path for Trump in Pennsylvania.
Taking a closer look, then, at the Keystone State, one of the reasons, besides its size, that this is of such interest to Trump and the Republicans, there's a trend here. You're looking at the Trump era. You're looking at party registration in Pennsylvania. And look at this, when Donald Trump first came on the scene, you know, back in 2016 the Democratic advantage in party registration in Pennsylvania was over 900,000 votes. 2020, look now in 2024 that's been cut almost in two thirds there, down to about 330,000. There's been a little bit of a boost for Democrats since Kamala Harris took over in registration, but the big picture trend here has been more competitive for Republicans in party registration. So, where are we looking in Pennsylvania, what's going to decide this state? Well, believe it or not, in the Trump era, there are only 10 counties in the entire state where Democrats perform better now than they did before Trump came along.
However, some of these counties are very big. Focus on these four collar counties right outside Philadelphia – Delaware, Chester, Montgomery, Bucks – more than a fifth of the vote statewide is going to come out of there. And look what's been happening here. Last pre-Trump election in these collar counties outside Philly, Democrats won them. Obama won by nine points, about 120,000 votes. Look what happened in 2020: almost a 20 point Democratic margin, nearly a 300,000 vote margin. This is where the Democrats have been growing – suburbs, places with lots of concentrations of high college degrees.
Can Harris do even better in those collar counties? That's critical for her.
And then, from Trump's standpoint, there's a lot of rural counties in the state that have gotten redder, small, rural counties. But let's talk about this collection here. Some people call this the Latino belt of Pennsylvania. These are counties that have some small to mid-sized cities with rapidly growing Latino populations. And we've been talking about Trump improving, relative to 2020 and 2016, among Hispanic voters. Well, you can see it. Here are some of the cities in that Latino belt in Pennsylvania. Reading, Pennsylvania. It's 70% Latino. Now, it was overwhelmingly Democratic in 2020. Joe Biden won by 45 points. But look at that. That's down almost 20 points from 2012. Hazelton, Pennsylvania, more than 60% Hispanic. In 2012, Democrats won it narrowly. It's now a double-digit Trump place. Allentown, it has come down 10 points in its margin for Democrats.
Can Trump grow new support in the Latino counties, the emerging Latino counties, with large populations of Latino voters in Pennsylvania? That's a key from his campaign standpoint, to the state – to the Keystone State.
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Crazy how a campaign that's supposedly only about white supremacy is doing so well among minorities and losing ground with whites.
I
The campaign isnt about white supremacy, but Trump's existence as a politician is.
The same people that look at Kamala and scream Marxist because of her father, need to look at Trump and scream racist because of his father's KKK ties.
good point
But you insist and insinuate that most MAGA's (whatever that term means) are hateful white supremacists, on a daily basis.
I dont think all MAGA's are hateful racists, some of them are just deluded or have been fooled by Trump. But the basis for Trump's climb through politics is absolutely racism. His 2012 presidential campaign (which was aborted when Obama released his birth certificate) was born from the racist birthers.
what do you think it means??????????
make america great again
it's what your traitor hero has been saying for 9 years now - but I guess he's going to make it great again again since he's been out of the picture as 'president'
There's no accounting for the idiots that believe him and jd.