The New York Times - USA (2020-10-26)

A16 N THE NEW YORK TIMES NATIONALMONDAY, OCTOBER 26, 2020

Election

their campaigns.
For years, affluent and college-
educated voters, mostly white,
had been the base of the Republi-
can Party. Exit polls showed Re-
publicans winning college gradu-
ates nationally from 1988 to 2004,
and again in 2012. Voters who
earned at least $100,000 have his-
torically sided with most Republi-
can presidential candidates by
comfortable margins, too.
But under Mr. Trump, Republi-
cans have hemorrhaged support
from white voters with college de-
grees, who polls show have been
repelled by his embrace of a poli-
tics of cultural division and racial
grievance.
The fund-raising data suggests
that erosion is not only harming
the party’s electoral prospects
but also its economic bottom line.
Mr. Trump lost the money race
in 2016, too, but he mobilized a
base of white working-class vot-
ers then that offset his losses
among college-educated voters.
Now he is trying to leverage the
powers of incumbency to do that
to an even greater degree. But
win or lose, Mr. Trump has accel-
erated a political realignment.
In ZIP codes with a median
household income of at least
$100,000, Mr. Biden smashed Mr.
Trump in fund-raising, $486 mil-
lion to only $167 million — ac-
counting for almost his entire fi-
nancial edge. In the rest of the
country, the two were knotted
closely together.
It was a similar story in the
most educated pockets of the
country, only even more pro-
nounced.
Of the ZIP codes where at least
65 percent of people had graduat-
ed from college — just over 1,
out of nearly 32,000 populated

ZIP codes that reported donations

— Mr. Biden outraised Mr. Trump

$478 million to $104 million. Below

that education level, Mr. Trump

was ahead by nearly $40 million.

“Alienating white college-edu-

cated voters means more than

just losing their votes; it’s also lit-

erally costing them money,” said

Amy Walter, the national editor of

the nonpartisan Cook Political Re-

port. “These are the kinds of

places that, not that long ago,

hosted high-dollar fund-raisers

exclusively for G.O.P. candidates.

Now, those donors are sitting in

their living rooms, tapping out do-

nations to Democrats around the

country via their smartphones.”

The analysis looked at more

than 25 million donations from

April 1 to Oct. 14, merging Federal

Election Commission filings from

the campaigns of Mr. Trump and

Mr. Biden, their joint operations

with the Republican National

Committee and Democratic Na-

tional Committee, and data from

the donation-processing sites

WinRed and ActBlue.

The analysis does not include

direct donations to the parties

themselves, but it covers more

than 90 percent of contributions to

Mr. Trump, Mr. Biden and the

committees directly linked to

them, from $1 gifts to checks of

more than $700,000.

The average donation to those

committees was $71 for Mr. Trump

and $76 for Mr. Biden.

Over all, Mr. Biden raised $1.

billion and Mr. Trump $734 million

over the last six months in the

32,000 populated ZIP codes, the

analysis shows.

The period analyzed is not a

perfect snapshot. Mr. Trump was

seeking money from donors, in-

cluding in wealthy enclaves, in the

months before Mr. Biden first

emerged as the presumptive

Democratic nominee. But during

the six months in which the choice

was between these two men, the

disparity was yawning.

Shift of Educated Voters

Whit Ayres, a Republican poll-

ster who studies demographic

trends, said “the donations mir-

ror voting patterns,” as white vot-

ers with college degrees have

swung sharply toward the Demo-

crats in the last decade, with the

trend expected to accelerate fur-

ther in 2020 with Mr. Trump on

the ticket.

“It makes perfect sense,” Mr.

Ayres said of the donation data.

“Basically, Republicans have

traded larger, more upscale, fast-

growing suburban counties for

smaller, down-scale, slower-

growing rural counties. That’s not

a promising trend for future vic-

tories.”

In Georgia, the data shows that

many of the suburban ZIP codes

surrounding Atlanta, which are

helping turn the state into a true

presidential battleground for the

first time in decades, are solidly

Democratic when it comes to the

number of donors, all the way

deep into Gwinnett County, a

swing county trending Democrat-

ic.

In Pennsylvania, the vote-rich

suburbs outside Philadelphia are

overwhelmingly blue, with virtu-

ally every ZIP code counting

more Biden donors than Trump

ones, including in Bucks County,

where Mr. Biden campaigned on

Saturday and where Mrs. Clinton

won by less than one percentage

point four years ago.

And in Virginia, the demo-

graphic march of the suburbs and

exurbs outside Washington, D.C.,

that have turned the state reliably

Democratic is apparent in the Bi-

den-leaning ZIP codes for donors

that stretch nearly to the West

Virginia border.

These political and fund-rais-

ing trends underscore the jeop-

ardy that Mr. Trump has created

for himself and his party: Rather

than enjoying the usual advan-

tages of incumbency, the presi-

dent is struggling to stanch the

bleeding for the G.O.P. in the sub-

urbs. His conduct, rhetoric and

record are imperiling some tradi-

tionally red Senate and House

seats because of the realignment

of college-educated voters toward

moderate Democrats emphasiz-

ing issues like health care and eco-

nomic growth.

“These voters with lots of dis-

posable income and deep antipa-

thy to Trump can channel their

frustration into Biden’s campaign

coffers,” said Ms. Walter of the

Cook Political Report.

The median household in the

United States was $68,703 in 2019.

In ZIP codes above that level, Mr.

Biden outraised Mr. Trump by

$389.1 million. Below that level,

Mr. Trump was actually ahead by

$53.4 million.

Wash.

Mont.

Wyo.

N.D.

Minn.

Wis.

Mich.

Iowa

Ill.

Ind.

S.D.

Neb.

Ore.

Calif.

Nev.

Idaho

Utah

Ariz.

Alaska

Hawaii

Source: Federal Election Commission | Notes: The map shows which candidate had more donors in each ZIP code from April 1, 2020, to Oct. 14, 2020. It shows only ZIP codes with at least 10 donors.

N.M.

Colo.

Kan.

Te x a s

Okla.

Ark.

Mo.

La.

Miss.

Ala. Ga.

Fla.

S.C.

Tenn.

Ky.

Ohio

Pa.

Vt.

Maine

N.H.

N.Y.

Va.

W. Va.

N.C.

Estimated donors by ZIP code,

since April

MORE TRUMP DONORS

+150+100+

MORE BIDEN DONORS

+50+100+

ELLA KOEZE AND GUILBERT GATES/THE NEW YORK TIMES

JUNE JULY AUGUST

Miami

Boston

N.Y.

D.C.

Dallas

Chicago

Denver

Minneapolis

L.A.

San Francisco

Seattle

Miami

Boston

N.Y.

D.C.

Dallas

Chicago

Denver

L.A.

San Francisco

Seattle

Miami

Boston

N.Y.

D.C.

Dallas

Chicago

Denver

L.A.

San Francisco

Seattle

Where the candidates raised their cash, month by month

Source: Federal Election Commission | Note: Maps include any ZIP codes with more than $50,000 in donations for a given month.

Each is a ZIP code. BIDEN TRUMP Size of arrow is the total amount raised in each ZIP code.

Map of Donors Reveals an America Split Along Class Lines

From Page A

Amount raised by day for each candidate

Biden

Trump

Source: Federal Election Commission | Data is from April 1, 2020, through Oct. 14, 2020. ELLA KOEZE AND GUILBERT GATES/THE NEW YORK TIMES

April May June July Aug. Sept. Oct.

$ 30 million

$ 20

$ 10

$

Donald Trump’s

birthday

Kamala Harris

named as V.P. pick

First presidential

debate

Donald Trump’s

speech at the R.N.C.

Divisions are

reshaping how the

two parties pay for

their campaigns.

Additional reporting by Lazaro
Gamio.

Note: Information about donors
giving $200 or less by check or
through the campaigns’ online
stores is not available.

.