Milk and eggs, meat and potatoes

Just like his win in 2016, Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 presidential election has taken many experts by surprise and spawned a flurry of post-election analyses. One of the more salient aspects of this election has to do with how the candidates fared among men and women—especially along the lines of different kinds of households. Trump’s detractors emphasized his characterization and treatment of women and, in some cases, sought to pit men and women against each other. Progressives even counseled married women whose husbands were Trump supporters to hide their affinities for Vice President Kamala Harris.

The actual turnout for Trump and Harris cut against such efforts and a narrative of a war between the sexes. There was a gender gap in Trump’s constituency. According to The Wall Street Journal, 54% of men favored Trump, while 46% of women supported him, a 3 percentage point improvement over his previous performance in 2020 in both cases. There was a 9 point gap in the support for Harris, with women at 53% and men at 44%, both of which were 2 points off of President Joe Biden’s 2020 levels. As the Financial Times reports, Trump saw gains among every demographic except for those 65 years old and older and among white college-educated women, groups where the movement was (minimally) negative.

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