When Americans first elected Donald Trump in 2016, the post-election explanation for his victory landed on two words: “economic anxiety.” And yet, researchers found racist resentment chiefly animated Trump’s voters.
After the midterm elections on Tuesday, a popular post-election explanation for why Trump’s party suffered a seismic defeat is again landing on economic anxiety. In this election cycle, though, economic anxiety has a new term: affordability.
To say voter concerns over affordability powered the blue wave in the 2026 midterm elections leaves out which group of voters had the most concerns over affordability.
And the voters who had the most concerns over affordability actually powered what Brittany Packnett Cunningham termed the “Black tsunami” in the 2026 midterm elections.
The post-election narrative is set to become imprecise if Americans don’t factor in race, just as the post-election narrative in 2016 ended up being imprecise because American pundits didn’t factor in racism.
The three major issues for voters during the midterm elections seem to have been corruption, the state of democracy, and the economy.
When taking race into account, midterm voters expressed little variance in their concerns over corruption and the state of democracy. Similar proportions of Latino voters (59%), Black voters (57%), and White voters (53%) considered “government corruption” to be “crucial” to their votes, according to the CNN analysis of SSRS’s Voter Poll. There was more variance in the proportions of White voters (35%), Black voters (29%), and Latino voters (26%) who rated “the state of democracy” as their “top issue,” according to AP’s analysis of the SSRS data.
Across six of the top issues that midterm voters identified in the SSRS Voter Poll, the most variance among racial groups came on concerns over affordability and the economy.
The economy was much more likely to be the “top issue” for Black voters (50%) and Latino voters (45%) than White voters (36%), according to AP’s analysis of Voter Poll data.
More than half of Black voters (52%) said the condition of the nation’s economy is “poor,” almost twenty points more than White voters (33%) and ten points more than Latino voters (42%). A similar disparity exists between Black voters (92%), Latino voters (82%), and White voters (72%) who said the nation’s economy is “poor or not good.”
When it comes to the “importance of cost of living to your vote,” 66% of Black voters and 62% of Latino voters said it was “crucial” compared to 45% of White voters, according to the CNN analysis. On the other side of the equation, 3% of Black voters considered cost of living to be a “minor factor” or “not a factor” in their votes, half that of Latino voters (6%) and four times less than White voters (13%).
A much higher percentage of Black voters than White voters said they are “very concerned” about the cost of gas (78% vs. 55%), the cost of food (79% vs. 55%), the cost of utilities (75% vs. 49%), and the cost of healthcare (72% vs. 56%), according to a CNN analysis of the AP voter poll.
Twice as many Black voters (36%) than White voters (18%) said “in the past year, inflation has caused” their family “severe hardship.”
What group of voters was most likely to blame the “policies” of the “Trump administration” for worsening “Americans’ well-being”? Black voters (80%), by wide margins over Latino voters (63%) and White voters (54%).
By a long shot, voters ages 18 to 29 rated “the economy and jobs” as the top issue impacting their voting choices, with 52% of them selecting it as one of their top 3 issues, according to the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE), which analyzed NORC Civic Health & Elections Project data. CIRCLE estimated that during this past midterm election, young Americans had their second-highest midterm turnout in three decades, shy of only the 2018 midterms.
CIRCLE and When We All Vote found earlier in the year that Black (70%) and Latino (68%) youth ages 18-29 were far more likely than White (53%) and AAPI (42%) youth to say they were “struggling” to make ends meet.
Political campaigns do not end when the elections end.
Politicians and their pundits attempt to shape post-election narratives on why they won in order to set expectations for their new policymaking agenda.
On what they will focus on.
On what they will not.
Yes, midterm voters have given the Democratic Party a mandate to reform if not revolutionize the economic policies that caused a sizable number (44%) of Americans to say their financial situation is worse today than two years ago.
But voters have also provided a mandate to address the racist economic policies that caused more Black (58%) and Latino voters (53%) than White voters (42%) to say their financial situation is worse off now than two years ago.
Before the election, the NORC Civic Health & Elections Project found “racism” to be the fourth most important issue for Black voters, slightly behind the war in Iran. Among young voters (18-29) who named “racism” as one of their top three priorities, 79% voted for Democrats, according to CIRCLE analysis of NORC Civic Health & Elections Project data.
Exit polling data from the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation found “racism and hate crimes” to be the top ranked issue among Black midterm voters, slightly ahead of voting rights and “inflation and cost of living.”
During the 2016 presidential election, White economic anxiety did not spell the beginning of Trump’s political career. It was racism. But the post-election analysis ignoring this racism allowed for its reproduction.
During the 2026 midterm elections, Black and Latino economic anxiety might very well spell the beginning of the end of Trump’s political career. Due to racism. The post-election analysis cannot ignore this racism again.
To discuss the affordability crisis among midterm voters and not discuss the racial disparities is to ensure the reproduction of racial economic disparities.
