Middle America has had enough of Kamala Harris

Jarron – a 37-year-old black man from a suburb of Atlanta – was quiet for most of my focus group. With him hunched over his clipboard most of the time, writing reams of notes but barely saying a word, I had surrendered to the fact I might not get much insight.

Then he said it. When I asked what hesitations this room of black voters had about Kamala Harris , Jarron glanced up.

"Woman problems", he said.

I pressed him for more. "Like, you know, dealing with men. This country's built on being a ****. But if you get a woman, you get more ideas, they're more, you know. Groan-ish."

Others in the group then piped in. A 54-year-old business owner and Biden voter worried she would be too "emotional". The women in the group said that Harris paled in comparison to Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama.

Their comments speak to something real happening in the state of Georgia – and elsewhere in the "sunbelt". Traditionally Democrat ethnic groups are seeing their levels of enthusiasm and support for their party fray.

Polling by the New York Times and Siena College published this week found that Trump has a 4-point lead over Harris in Georgia, a 5-point lead in Arizona, and a 2-point lead in North Carolina. Nevada, also a swing state but not polled by Siena, is leaning Trump by 52 per cent in our JL Partners model.

To a commentator twenty years ago, these margins would not be seen as good news for the Republican candidate. The sunbelt states have been traditional Republican strongholds, shored up by Richard Nixon's "southern strategy" and entrenched further by Ronald Reagan's focus on low taxes, small government, and strong national defense.

But the 2000s and 2010s saw significant demographic shifts, with an influx of younger and more diverse populations. That included more Hispanic communities moving into Arizona and Nevada, and more college-educated white people moving to the suburbs of boom towns like Charlotte, North Carolina and Atlanta, Georgia. With their population increasing, these states carry significant electoral college votes and are now a crucial battleground.

Donald Trump is muscling his way back in . Part of the reason is the same as anywhere else: an unpopular incumbent administration, the pain of inflation lingering, and concern about crime on the streets.

But there is something else taking place too. Those non-white communities, always counted on by the Democrats, are becoming more likely to switch their vote.

In 2012, the Republican candidate Mitt Romney only won around 27 per cent of the Hispanic vote. In 2020, Trump won as much as 38 per cent, and Republicans continued to win big with this group in the 2022 midterms. That shift – particularly amongst Cuban Hispanics – helped lock Florida into a safe red state for the Republicans. It is now having a similar effect out west.

I interviewed Hispanic voters in Arizona and there was one clear answer as to why the people I spoke to were leaning Trump: the border. With an influx in illegal crossings from Mexico throughout the Biden administration, these first and second generation migrants are fed up. They and their parents did it the right way – working hard, balancing two or three jobs – and now they see people skipping the queue. Trump must be cautious that his rhetoric does not seem anti-immigrant rather than anti-immigration, but his policy of "sealing the border" is appealing to this group.

Black voters' enthusiasm for the Democrats is waning too. Though unlikely to back the Republicans in large numbers – the electoral cleavage prompted by Republican Barry Goldwater's opposition to the Civil Rights Act still runs deep – they increasingly question whether the Democrats align to their values.

Mikael, a young black schoolteacher in Atlanta, told me that "transgender issues" pushed by the Democrats made her doubt them. In her words, because "black families are really big about protecting the children, we're maybe changing our vote because we don't want those types of issues to be given over to our kids at such a young age".

Biden got African Americans to turn out in huge numbers in 2020, trading off his time in the Obama administration and a longstanding popularity in black communities. Kamala Harris might be the first black woman to vote for president, but the views of voters like Jarron suggest some here still think the woman part of her identity is a bigger issue. Just two years ago, Stacey Abrams – another black woman – ran for Governor of Georgia and failed to mobilise the black vote.

There are risks for Trump in these states. North Carolina is his weakest link, and the national party has practically disowned the Republican nominee for Governor there after damaging allegations concerning his pornography habits and more. Trump's efforts in Arizona are hobbled by an abortion referendum being on the ballot in the state, likely to improve Democrat turnout.

And for all his fortune in the sunbelt, it is – by a whisker – not enough to win. Gaining these four states would mean Harris in the White House, with an Electoral College margin of 270 to 268. Trump must carry a Midwestern state too, likely one of Pennsylvania, Michigan or Wisconsin.

It's so far so good in the sunbelt for Trump. But a win there only lightens the load; he will need more to march the road to victory.