BackTrump trails among seniors, key group in many battleground states
Some states with big populations of people over 65 years old are also places where voters appear to be shifting away from Trump, polls show
PremiumRepublicans have won the senior vote in the last four presidential elections. This year, older voters are showing signs of having second thoughts about President Trump, one reason he is lagging behind Democratic nominee Joe Biden in polls of some of the most important battlegrounds.
Mr. Trump won seniors by 7 percentage points in 2016 but has trailed Mr. Biden by 10 points with that group all year in Wall Street Journal/NBC News polling. The coronavirus pandemic is making it hard for the president to rebound with older voters, who are among those most vulnerable to Covid-19.
Mr. Trump’s weakened standing with seniors is particularly important because of one demographic fact: Nearly every competitive state in the election is also home to large shares of people age 65 and older—larger than the national average.
Some of the most senior-heavy states are also places where voters appear to be shifting away from Mr. Trump, according to recent polls.
Maine is the nation’s oldest state, with seniors accounting for more than one resident in five. Current polling, as reflected in the FiveThirtyEight.com average of surveys, shows Maine voters making the biggest swing of any battleground state toward the Democratic nominee compared with the 2016 vote. Mr. Biden leads by 15 points in combined polls of Maine, a 12-point move for Democrats from four years ago that puts at risk the one Electoral College vote the state gave Mr. Trump.
Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, all Democratic-leaning states that Mr. Trump won in 2016, rank in the top 20 for states with the largest shares of seniors. Current polling shows each state has moved about 8 points in favor of the Democratic nominee compared with the 2016 outcome. Arizona, which ranks 12th for senior population, has swung by about 7 points.
Florida, Iowa and New Hampshire are also battleground states that rank in the top 20 for share of senior residents.
Interviews and polling suggest that Mr. Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic is weighing on the minds of older voters.
“It has bothered me a lot, because of my age and the way he acts like, ‘Oh, it’s nothing,’" said Virginia Chronister of York, Pa., who voted for Mr. Trump in 2016. “Yeah, OK, buddy boy, it’s something very serious…This is nothing you just sneeze over." Ms. Chronister, 80 years old, says some of her friends have become very ill from the virus.
David Schwartz voted for Mr. Trump in 2016 and says he has already cast a ballot for him again this year. A retired cheese-factory worker in Marinette County, Wis., north of Green Bay, he believes Mr. Trump struck the right balance in trying to tackle the pandemic while limiting damage to the economy.
“I wear my mask when I go to the stores and all that," said Mr. Schwartz, 72. “There’s ways of doing this without shutting everything down."
Mr. Trump spoke to an audience of seniors in Fort Myers, Fla., on Friday, promising to provide a coronavirus vaccine at no cost to nursing homes. “No cost," he emphasized in the speech.
The profile of senior voters can vary by state. Florida, which has the largest share of seniors after Maine, draws retirees from around the country. Pennsylvania, which ranks eighth, is one of the oldest states in part because many young people left after the steel and manufacturing sectors stopped providing as many jobs.
Mike Mikus, a Democratic political consultant outside Pittsburgh, said many seniors in western Pennsylvania voted for Mr. Trump out of hopes that he would revive a local economy still trying to rebound from deindustrialization. “Western Pennsylvania is really old," said Mr. Mikus. “People remember the times when the steel mills were booming and you would go downtown, and there would be a movie theater and restaurants, and now it’s gone."
Now, senior voters are weighing those hopes against the fact that many of them can’t see their grandchildren due to the pandemic. Mr. Mikus predicted that Mr. Trump would again win the counties outside Pittsburgh, but by smaller margins. “And it will be primarily because of older people," he said.
In Pennsylvania, Mr. Biden’s advantage among seniors was larger than his overall lead in a recent Quinnipiac Poll and a survey by the New York Times/Siena College.
Asked whether the economy or coronavirus was more important to their vote for president, more seniors in the Journal/NBC News national survey picked coronavirus, the only age group to do so, though the preference among seniors was narrow. Seniors were also more likely than other age groups to say Mr. Trump was taking unnecessary risks with his own health when it comes to the virus.
And when voters were asked which kind of candidate they wanted most—someone who would confront the establishment or one who showed compassion and competence—57% of seniors picked compassion and competence, compared with 49% of voters overall.
In Michigan, Mr. Biden led by 15 points among seniors, compared with 9 points among all likely voters, a recent EPIC-MRA survey found.
Michigan voter William Kludt, 76, backed Mr. Trump in 2016 but says he now regrets it, in part because he believes the president is pitting Americans against each other.
“And on the Covid-19 thing, we have a lot of people dead who shouldn’t be dead," said Mr. Kludt, of Oceana County. He said nations that followed the guidance of scientists more closely lost fewer people.
This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text
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