The counties to watch on the massive midterm elections battlefield

The breadth of the public backlash against President Donald Trump’s tumultuous second term is rapidly widening the campaign battlefield for 2026.

Discontent with his performance is allowing Democrats to seriously contest House and Senate seats in places where they have struggled for years — including blue-collar and rural communities.

Democrats still face many hurdles in those culturally conservative places, but Republicans are suddenly pouring money into states such as Alaska, Texas, Iowa, and Ohio that have long seemed secure for the GOP. Republicans are nervously watching their candidates belatedly break from Trump over tariffs, the Iran war and other policies.

John Anzalone, a veteran Democratic pollster who has long focused on races in Republican-leaning terrain, says the erosion of Trump’s support is creating opportunities for Democrats in states and districts that few anticipated could be competitive, including Republican-held Senate seats in Kansas , Nebraska and even Mississippi . Whether or not Democrats ultimately capture those seats, the sudden emergence of late-breaking threats to entrenched incumbents, Anzalone says, is a characteristic feature of wave elections — like the 1994 deluge when Republicans swept into control of both the House and Senate after then-President Bill Clinton’s chaotic first two years in office.

“This feels more like 1994 and what I mean by that is not the total number of seats [in play],” Anzalone says. “But it’s that you feel like America is the battleground.” Just as in 1994, Anzalone predicts, this election will produce “accidental members of Congress” — Democrats whose victories almost no one saw coming.

Whit Ayres, a longtime Republican pollster, isn’t as pessimistic about the GOP’s prospects. But he’s worried about the trend lines and bracing for unexpected and unpleasant surprises. “In this environment, I think we are going to find states in play that we never thought would be in play come in November,” Ayres says.

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In polling, Trump’s job approval has generally declined the most since he returned to office among the groups that moved the most toward him in 2024, including young men, Latinos and all non-White voters without a four-year college degree. But he’s also suffering cracks in perennial pillars of his coalition, including White voters without college degrees, rural voters, and traditional Republicans who identify more with the party than Trump’s MAGA movement.

Coming out of this election, “I think there is going to be a bunch of narratives,” says Anzalone. “One is going to be that Latinos, African Americans, young people came back to the Democrats. That’s going to be number one. But you are going to see a [Republican] bleeding of White working-class voters; and you are going to see a narrowing of the vote in rural America.”

In the 2024 election, Trump gained ground almost everywhere; he improved his performance over 2020 in nearly 90% of America’s roughly 3,100 counties. Only one month from Election Day, polls suggest Republicans this year face the nightmare possibility of that tape rolling backwards: a retreat in counties of all sizes and demographic composition, in all regions of the country.

To better map the evolving 2026 battlefield, CNN has identified about two dozen representative counties across six distinct demographic and geographic buckets. Together, the results on Election Day in House, Senate and gubernatorial contests from these six groups of counties will document the trends in voter allegiance that will determine the 2026 outcome.

What follows is a checklist of counties in these six categories to watch on election night.

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Amid all the positive news for Democrats in recent polls, their performance in big urban centers with large minority populations remains a question mark. While Trump modestly increased his vote total in many urban centers in 2024, the vote total for then-Vice President Kamala Harris plummeted in many of them.

Four counties will offer different measures of whether Democrats can rebuild their urban strength.

Wayne County (centered on Detroit), like Cuyahoga (Cleveland) in Ohio, will answer whether Democrats have addressed their turnout problems among urban Black voters from 2024. Harris won 40,000 fewer votes than Joe Biden in 2020 in Cuyahoga and 60,000 less in Wayne.

Alvin Bernard Tillery, a Democratic pollster who studies Black voters, worries that Democrats are still not on track to generate the margins they need in these core urban counties. “The data has been there for a while” indicating the risk of another lackluster Black turnout, Tillery says, “but people have been ignoring because they want to believe that the old turnout machine is going to hold. And we have seen since 2024 it’s not holding.”

Tarrant County, a majority non-White Texas county revolving around Ft. Worth, has been true swing territory: it narrowly voted for Democrat Beto O’Rourke in his 2018 Senate race and against him in his 2022 governor race. Likewise, it backed Trump in 2016 and 2024 but Biden in 2020. Matt Mackowiak, a Texas GOP strategist who advised Republican Sen. John Cornyn, says Tarrant will measure the disaffection among traditional Republican voters from Ken Paxton, who beat Cornyn for the GOP Senate nomination. “Tarrant is going to be a bloodbath” for Paxton, Mackowiak predicts. “Most of everyone who has a working brain on my side of the aisle thinks Tarrant is gone.”

Hennepin County , centered on Minneapolis, is better educated and more affluent than the others on this list. Yet the Democratic vote nosedived there too in 2024. Its performance in the Minnesota governor and Senate races will measure the intensity of the well-educated backlash against Trump-in a place where federal agents earlier this year killed two White middle-class residents protesting the massive ICE crackdown in the city.

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These well-educated, affluent and majority White counties immediately outside major cities, especially in Northern states, first shifted blue under Bill Clinton in the 1990s. Since Trump’s emergence, most of them have trended further away from the GOP — though in 2024, most of these places, like almost everywhere else, tilted right amid disappointment over Biden’s record.

Delaware in Ohio, north of Columbus, and Waukesha , west of Milwaukee, are each overwhelmingly White, with many more college graduates and much higher incomes than the national average. They are also two of the largest Northern suburbs that still lean Republican: Trump in 2024 won Delaware by seven points and Waukesha by nearly three times that. Whether Democrats can improve in the Ohio Senate (behind Sherrod Brown) and governor (Amy Acton) races and the Wisconsin governor race (with David Crowley) will test how much Trump’s elevated disapproval rating among college-educated voters is costing the GOP.

Kent County , centered on Grand Rapids, is closer to the national average in education and income. The results there, (as well as in Oakland County outside Detroit, which is even more affluent and educated) for Abdul El-Sayed and Jocelyn Benson, the Democrats in the Michigan Senate and governor races, will send similar signals.

Improving on the eight-point margins amassed by Biden and Harris in prosperous (the median income exceeds $109,000), very well-educated Johnson County (nearly 60% of adults hold college degrees) in the Kansas City suburbs will be key to Democrat Adam Hamilton’s hope of breaking the party’s nearly 100-year losing streak in Kansas Senate races.

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While many suburbs initially developed after World War II as the destination for “White flight” from heavily minority central cities, the 21st century has seen the emergence of well-educated, middle to upper-middle class suburbs that are also racially diverse, especially in big Sunbelt metropolitan areas.

These growing areas — where minorities constitute about half the population or more and the median income and share of adults with a four-year college degree both generally exceed the national average — have been essential to the Democrats’ increased competitiveness across the Sunbelt . Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff looks poised to expand on his 2020 margin of 16 points in Gwinnett County , with its large Black, Asian and Latino population northeast of Atlanta and his 10-point edge in demographically similar Cobb County to its west. Emory University political scientist Andra Gillespie says she’ll be watching whether the Republican decline extends beyond the inner-ring suburbs to reliably red Atlanta exurbs including Cherokee and Forsyth .

In 2020, Biden became the first Democratic presidential nominee since Harry Truman in 1948 to win Maricopa County , centered on Phoenix and its suburbs. It also narrowly backed Democrats Katie Hobbs and Mark Kelly for governor and Senator in 2022, before it split between Trump and Democratic Senator Ruben Gallego in 2024. The county looks ready to lean back toward Democrats in Hobbs’ reelection this November.

Orange County, California is often described as the birthplace of the modern conservative movement during the 1960s. But with its large Latino and Asian populations it has become a battleground that voted solidly for Biden in 2020, but only narrowly for Harris in 2024. The California governor race, and multiple House seats across the county, will test how deeply Trump has alienated those communities.

Diverse, well-educated and very affluent (with a median income of nearly $122,000), Collin County north of Dallas may be this year’s most intriguing suburban melting pot. The county is where Paxton started his political career; but with its substantial Asian, Latino and Black populations it trended blue from 2016 to 2020, before reverting toward the GOP under Biden. Trump won it in 2024 by nine points, about double his margin four years before. The open anti-Asian racism of Bo French , the GOP nominee for the Texas Railroad Commission, could produce a significant backlash in its large Asian community. How far Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico advances in Collin — and other populous Texas counties that combine high diversity and high education levels, including Denton , Williamson and Fort Bend , may determine his fate.

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Trump made many of his biggest 2024 gains in counties with large Latino populations and very modest levels of education and income, including the preponderantly Mexican-American Rio Grande Valley counties of Hidalgo (centered on McAllen) and Cameron (Brownsville); Miami-Dade , with its large contingent of central and South Americans; and the Bronx , with its vibrant Puerto Rican and Dominican populations . In both Hidalgo and Cameron, Trump in 2024 improved his margin by about 40 points compared to 2016; Harris won nearly 140,000 fewer votes in Miami-Dade than Biden did. In the Bronx, the Democratic margin declined by 23 points from 2016-2024.

But amid frustration over the economy and backlash against his aggressive deportation drive, no major group has recoiled from Trump more sharply in his second term than Latinos. National polls routinely show 60% or more of them disapprove of his job performance. Maria Di Franco Quinonez, senior research director at Equis Research, a Democratic polling firm focusing on Latinos, says that in the group’s polling a substantial minority of Trump’s 2024 Latino supporters express regret or disappointment about their vote.

That recoil, she says, is unfolding broadly, among both Latino women and men, voters with and without a four-year college degree, and in all areas of the country. “We are seeing [it] cut across all the regions we track,” she says.

The open question is how much the disenchantment with Trump translates into support for Democrats who many of these Latino voters, pollsters agree, still view with suspicion.

Key tests of how much Democrats can recover will include: Talarico’s performance in the Rio Grande Valley counties; the outcome of three hotly contested House races there; whether Democrats can seriously threaten Republican Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar in her Miami area district; and whether New York Gov. Kathy Hochul restores the party’s traditional edge in the Bronx during her reelection campaign.

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Trump’s dominance in places populated by large numbers of White voters without a four-year college degree has been the key to his reconfiguration of the GOP coalition — and the political map.

But while Trump carried about two-thirds of White voters without a four-year degree in each of his three presidential bids, his approval rating among them in many national polls has fallen to only about 50-50 or less . These voters consistently express intense disappointment with his record on inflation, and opposition to his tariffs and the Iran war. “There is definitely evidence of them backing away and there is an opportunity for Democrats to make gains there,” says Dan Conway, political director of Welcome, a centrist Democratic group that recently conducted focus groups of heartland blue-collar voters.

In the counties listed below, Whites represent a clear majority of the population, only about 25%-30% of adults hold college degrees, and the median income consistently lags the national average. In Northeast Pennsylvania, narrowing the traditional GOP margin in Luzerne (Wilkes-Barre) while rebuilding a bigger Democratic advantage in neighboring Lackawanna (Scranton) will be the key to Democrat Paige Cognetti’s hopes of unseating first-term Republican Rep. Rob Bresnahan in a closely watched House race.

In Ohio, Brown must restore his margin in Lorain , outside Cleveland, after it tumbled from 18.5 points in his 2018 win to just five points in his 2024 loss. (He faces the same challenge in Northeastern Ohio counties such as Mahoning around Youngstown.) In the Michigan Senate and governor races, Macomb County — fabled since the 1980s as the home of blue-collar “Reagan Democrats ” — represents a critical opportunity for Democrats: It has solidly backed Trump in all three of his races, but leaned toward other Democrats, such as outgoing Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, when he wasn’t on the ballot. Catawba County northwest of Charlotte adds a southern spin, with far more White evangelical Christians than its northern blue-collar counterparts : It usually gives Republicans a 40-point margin, but Roy Cooper, the Democratic Senate nominee, shaved that by about 10 points in his 2020 gubernatorial win.

Most voters in these blue-collar communities “are not ideological voters; they are voters who feel like the game is rigged against them and somebody needs to fix the system,” says Dante Chinni, director of the American Communities Project at Michigan State University. That conviction, he notes, has drawn many of them to Trump for a decade. But now, Chinni says, “a lot of them [are feeling] that ‘he said he was going to fix everything and he didn’t, and I’m mad at him, too.’”

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Rural America has been the GOP’s last line of defense in the Trump era. But even that fortress may be cracking.

Trump’s policies have squeezed the rural economy from multiple directions . Tariffs have raised the cost of farm machinery and other key agricultural inputs, and disrupted export markets. The Iran war has spiked the cost of fuel and fertilizer. The Medicaid cuts in last year’s reconciliation bill threaten rural hospitals . Immigration enforcement raids have disrupted meat packing operations. “He’s really hurt the rural voters quite a bit with all of this,” says Nathaniel Birkhead, professor of political science at Kansas State University. And unlike earlier agriculture crises, Birkhead notes, farmers can directly link their stress to policies that Trump “chose to do” — and that House and Senate Republicans have repeatedly voted to support.

Still, the Trump administration is channeling massive federal subsidies to farmers — while also doling out grants from the reconciliation bill’s fund for rural hospitals. And rural voters may be the most receptive audience anywhere for the GOP’s cultural arguments against Democrats.

For Democrats, it’s not realistic to flip the rural counties Trump won by astronomical margins. Their goal is to lose by less. Dan Kanninen, the battleground states director for Harris in 2024, says the math in states with big rural populations looks much more achievable for Democrats if “instead of winning 20 rural counties by 40 points, Republicans win them only by 18 points.”

Good places to watch whether Democrats can narrow the traditional GOP rural margins will include Ford County in southwest Kansas, which includes the meat packing center of Dodge City; Darke County in western Ohio, which relies on corn, soybeans, chicken and eggs; Grant County , a dairy, corn and soybean center on the southwestern border of Wisconsin; and Scott County in eastern Iowa, which mostly produces corn, soybeans and hogs. Except for Ford, which includes a large Latino population, these counties are overwhelmingly White with a lower median income than the national average; except for Scott, they have many fewer college grads than average.

Across these normally Republican areas, “The issue will be turnout,” says Art Cullen, editor of the Storm Lake Times Pilot in rural Northwest Iowa. “[This year] you just don’t see the Republican yard signs and the huge Trump signs. Signs don’t mean that much, but they are a pretty decent barometer of voter enthusiasm.”

With the election now only a little over one month away, the key dynamic isn’t that the GOP is facing elevated vulnerability in any one of these groupings. It’s that the party must simultaneously fortify its position in all of them as the wave of dissatisfaction with Trump’s second term builds . This year’s key races are being fought almost entirely on traditionally Republican terrain , and the reddest places on that map may naturally drift back toward the GOP by Election Day. But that still leaves a big battlefield for Republicans to reinforce — and not much time to do it.

公众对唐纳德·特朗普总统动荡的第二任期的强烈反对，正在迅速扩大2026年总统竞选的战场。

对他的表现感到不满，这使得民主党人得以在他们多年来一直难以赢得的地区（包括蓝领社区和农村社区）认真地争夺众议院和参议院席位。

民主党在那些文化保守的地区仍然面临诸多阻碍，但共和党却突然向阿拉斯加、德克萨斯、爱荷华和俄亥俄等长期以来被视为共和党铁票仓的州投入大量资金。共和党人正忐忑不安地关注着他们的候选人，看他们是否会在关税、伊朗战争和其他政策问题上与特朗普决裂。

长期关注共和党传统票仓选情的资深民主党民调专家约翰·安扎隆表示，特朗普支持率的下滑为民主党在一些此前鲜有人预料到会成为竞争激烈的州和选区创造了机会，其中包括堪萨斯州、内布拉斯加州甚至密西西比州的共和党把持的参议院席位。安扎隆指出，无论民主党最终能否拿下这些席位，这种对根深蒂固的现任议员构成威胁的突然出现，都是选举浪潮的典型特征——就像1994年共和党在时任总统比尔·克林顿混乱的头两年任期结束后，横扫众议院和参议院的局面一样。

“这感觉更像是1994年，我指的不是席位总数，”安扎隆说，“而是你会觉得美国成了战场。”安扎隆预测，就像1994年一样，这次选举也会产生一些“意外当选的国会议员”——一些民主党人的胜利几乎出乎所有人的意料。

长期为共和党民调机构工作的惠特·艾尔斯对共和党的前景并不那么悲观。但他对目前的趋势线感到担忧，并做好了应对意外和不利局面的准备。“在这种环境下，我认为到了11月，我们会发现一些我们以前从未想过会成为摇摆州的州也变成了摇摆州，”艾尔斯说。

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民调显示，自特朗普重返总统宝座以来，他的支持率下降幅度最大的群体正是那些在2024年大选中最倾向于支持他的群体，包括年轻男性、拉丁裔以及所有未获得四年制大学学位的非白人选民。但他的支持联盟中一些长期占据主导地位的群体也出现了裂痕，例如未获得大学学位的白人选民、农村选民以及那些更认同共和党而非特朗普“让美国再次伟大”（MAGA）运动的传统共和党人。

安扎隆表示，这次选举之后，“我认为会出现很多不同的叙事。其中一种叙事是拉丁裔、非裔美国人和年轻人重新支持民主党。这将是首要叙事。但你会看到共和党流失大量白人工薪阶层选民；你还会看到共和党在农村地区的得票率下降。”

在2024年的选举中，特朗普几乎在所有地方都取得了进展；在全美约3100个县中，近90%的县他的支持率都高于2020年。然而，距离选举日仅剩一个月，民调显示，共和党今年面临着噩梦般的局面：支持率可能出现倒退，在全国各地、各种规模和人口结构的县都可能出现下滑。

为了更好地描绘2026年大选的格局，CNN选取了六个不同的人口统计和地理区域，并选取了大约二十几个具有代表性的县。这六个县在众议院、参议院和州长选举日的投票结果，将共同反映出选民倾向的趋势，而这些趋势将决定2026年的最终结果。

以下是选举之夜需要关注的六大类县的清单。

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尽管近期民调显示民主党人支持率普遍上升，但他们在少数族裔人口众多的大城市的表现仍然存疑。2024年，特朗普在许多城市地区的得票数略有上升，而时任副总统卡马拉·哈里斯在这些地区的得票数却大幅下降。

四个县将从不同角度衡量民主党能否重建其在城市地区的影响力。

韦恩县（以底特律为中心）与俄亥俄州的库亚霍加县（克利夫兰）一样，将检验民主党是否已解决2024年城市黑人选民的投票率问题。2020年，哈里斯在库亚霍加县的得票比乔·拜登少了4万张，在韦恩县少了6万张。

研究黑人选民的民主党民调专家阿尔文·伯纳德·蒂勒里担心，民主党在这些核心城市县仍然无法获得所需的优势。“数据已经存在一段时间了”，蒂勒里说，这表明黑人选民的投票率可能再次低迷，“但人们一直忽视这些数据，因为他们想当然地认为以往的投票机制仍然有效。但自2024年以来，我们已经看到这种机制不再奏效。”

塔兰特县是德克萨斯州一个以沃斯堡为中心的县，白人人口占多数，一直以来都是摇摆州：该县在2018年民主党参议员竞选中以微弱优势支持了贝托·奥鲁克，但在2022年州长竞选中却反对了他。同样，该县在2016年和2024年支持了特朗普，但在2020年支持了拜登。曾担任共和党参议员约翰·科宁顾问的德克萨斯州共和党策略师马特·麦考维亚克表示，塔兰特县的选举结果将检验传统共和党选民对肯·帕克斯顿的不满程度，帕克斯顿击败了科宁，赢得了共和党参议员提名。“对帕克斯顿来说，塔兰特县将是一场惨败，”麦考维亚克预测道。“我们这边的大多数头脑清醒的人都认为，塔兰特县已经没戏了。”

以明尼阿波利斯为中心的亨内平县，比名单上的其他县受教育程度更高，也更富裕。然而，2024年民主党在该县的得票率也大幅下降。该县在明尼苏达州州长和参议员选举中的表现，将衡量受过良好教育的民众对特朗普的反弹强度——就在今年早些时候，联邦特工在该县枪杀了两位抗议美国移民及海关执法局（ICE）大规模打击行动的白人中产阶级居民。

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这些位于主要城市周边、受过良好教育、经济富裕且以白人为主的县，尤其是在北部各州，在20世纪90年代比尔·克林顿执政时期首次转为民主党阵营。自特朗普崛起以来，其中大多数县的倾向进一步远离共和党——尽管在2024年，由于对拜登的政绩感到失望，这些地方中的大多数，像几乎所有其他地方一样，都转向了共和党。

俄亥俄州哥伦布市以北的特拉华市和密尔沃基市以西的沃基沙市，这两个城市都以白人为主，大学毕业生比例远高于全国平均水平，收入也远高于全国平均水平。它们也是北部最大的两个仍然倾向于共和党的郊区：2024年，特朗普在特拉华市以7个百分点的优势获胜，在沃基沙市的得票率更是接近特拉华市的三倍。民主党能否在俄亥俄州参议员（谢罗德·布朗的竞选）、州长（艾米·阿克顿的竞选）以及威斯康星州州长（戴维·克劳利的竞选）的选举中有所斩获，将检验特朗普在受过大学教育的选民中日益增长的低支持率究竟给共和党造成了多大的损失。

以大急流城为中心的肯特县，其教育水平和收入更接近全国平均水平。该县（以及底特律郊外的奥克兰县，后者更加富裕且教育水平更高）的选举结果，对于密歇根州参议员和州长竞选中的民主党候选人阿卜杜勒·埃尔-赛义德和乔斯林·本森而言，将发出类似的信号。

拜登和哈里斯在堪萨斯城郊区富裕（中位收入超过 109,000 美元）、教育水平很高（近 60% 的成年人拥有大学学位）的约翰逊县获得了 8 个百分点的优势，而民主党人亚当·汉密尔顿能否打破该党在堪萨斯州参议院选举中近 100 年的连败纪录，将是关键所在。

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虽然许多郊区最初是在二战后发展起来的，作为“白人逃离”少数族裔聚居的中心城市的目的地，但 21 世纪以来，受过良好教育的中产阶级到中上层阶级郊区也出现了，这些郊区也具有种族多样性，尤其是在阳光地带的大都市区。

这些新兴地区——少数族裔人口占比约占一半甚至更多，中位收入和拥有四年制大学学位的成年人比例通常都高于全国平均水平——对于民主党在阳光地带日益增强的竞争力至关重要。民主党参议员乔恩·奥索夫有望在格温内特县扩大其2020年16个百分点的领先优势。格温内特县位于亚特兰大东北部，拥有大量黑人、亚裔和拉丁裔人口。此外，在人口结构相似的西部科布县，奥索夫也拥有10个百分点的领先优势。埃默里大学政治学家安德拉·吉莱斯皮表示，她将密切关注共和党的颓势是否会蔓延到亚特兰大周边传统共和党票仓，例如切罗基县和福赛斯县。

2020年，拜登成为自1948年哈里·杜鲁门以来首位赢得马里科帕县（以凤凰城及其郊区为中心）的民主党总统候选人。该县在2022年州长选举中以微弱优势支持民主党候选人凯蒂·霍布斯，参议员选举中支持马克·凯利，但在2024年大选中，该县在特朗普和民主党参议员鲁本·加列戈之间摇摆不定。今年11月，霍布斯竞选连任时，该县似乎准备再次倒向民主党。

加州橙县常被认为是20世纪60年代现代保守主义运动的发源地。但由于其庞大的拉丁裔和亚裔人口，该县已成为两党角逐的战场。2020年，该县选民坚定地支持拜登，但在2024年，他们仅以微弱优势支持哈里斯。此次加州州长选举以及该县多个众议院席位的争夺，将检验特朗普与这些社区的疏离程度。

科林县位于达拉斯北部，人口多元化，教育水平高，经济非常富裕（家庭收入中位数接近12.2万美元），可能是今年最引人关注的郊区“大熔炉”。帕克斯顿的政治生涯就始于此；但由于该县亚裔、拉丁裔和非裔人口众多，在2016年至2020年间，科林县的民主党倾向逐渐增强，但在拜登执政期间又转而支持共和党。特朗普在2024年以9个百分点的优势赢得了该县，大约是四年前得票优势的两倍。共和党德克萨斯州铁路委员会候选人博·弗伦奇公开的反亚裔种族主义言论，可能会在该县庞大的亚裔社区引发强烈反弹。民主党参议员候选人詹姆斯·塔拉里科在科林县以及其他人口众多、兼具高度多元化和高教育水平的德克萨斯州县（包括丹顿县、威廉姆森县和福特本德县）的选情，或许将决定他的最终命运。

Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis/Getty Images

特朗普在2024年大选中取得的最大胜利大多来自拉丁裔人口众多、教育水平和收入水平相对较低的县，包括以墨西哥裔美国人为主的格兰德河谷伊达尔戈县（以麦卡伦为中心）和卡梅伦县（以布朗斯维尔为中心）；拥有大量中美洲和南美洲移民的迈阿密-戴德县；以及拥有充满活力的波多黎各裔和多米尼加裔人口的布朗克斯区。在伊达尔戈县和卡梅伦县，特朗普在2024年的得票优势比2016年提高了约40个百分点；哈里斯在迈阿密-戴德县的得票数比拜登少了近14万张。在布朗克斯区，民主党的得票优势从2016年到2024年下降了23个百分点。

但由于对经济的失望以及对其激进驱逐政策的强烈反对，在特朗普的第二个任期内，没有哪个主要群体比拉丁裔群体对特朗普的反感更为强烈。全国民调经常显示，60%甚至更多的拉丁裔选民不认可他的执政表现。专注于拉丁裔选民的民主党民调机构Equis Research的高级研究主管玛丽亚·迪·弗朗哥·奎诺内斯表示，在该机构的民调中，相当一部分支持特朗普2024年大选的拉丁裔选民对投票感到后悔或失望。

她说，这种反弹正在广泛蔓延，无论是在拉丁裔女性还是男性中，无论是拥有四年制大学学位的选民还是没有四年制大学学位的选民中，都存在这种情况，而且遍及全国各地。“我们看到，在我们追踪的所有地区，这种反弹都在发生，”她说。

目前的问题是，对特朗普的失望情绪在多大程度上会转化为对民主党的支持，民调专家一致认为，许多拉丁裔选民仍然对民主党抱有怀疑态度。

检验民主党人能否重振旗鼓的关键因素包括：塔拉里科在格兰德河谷各县的表现；该地区三场竞争激烈的众议院选举结果；民主党人能否在迈阿密地区的选区对共和党众议员玛丽亚·埃尔维拉·萨拉萨尔构成真正的威胁；以及纽约州州长凯西·霍楚尔能否在连任竞选期间恢复该党在布朗克斯的传统优势。

安吉拉·韦斯/法新社/盖蒂图片社

特朗普在白人选民人数众多但未获得四年制大学学位的地区占据主导地位，这是他重塑共和党联盟和政治版图的关键。

尽管特朗普在其三次总统竞选中都赢得了约三分之二未获得四年制大学学位的白人选民的支持，但在许多全国民调中，他在该群体中的支持率已跌至五五开甚至更低。这些选民一直对他应对通胀的记录深感失望，并反对他的关税政策和伊朗战争。“有迹象表明他们正在疏远特朗普，民主党有机会赢得这部分选民的支持，”中间派民主党团体“欢迎”（Welcome）的政治主管丹·康威（Dan Conway）说道。该团体近期对美国中西部蓝领选民进行了焦点小组访谈。

在以下列出的几个县中，白人占人口的绝大多数，只有约25%-30%的成年人拥有大学学位，而且收入中位数一直低于全国平均水平。在宾夕法尼亚州东北部，民主党候选人佩奇·科涅蒂能否在备受瞩目的众议院选举中击败共和党现任众议员罗布·布雷斯纳汉，关键在于能否缩小共和党在卢泽恩县（威尔克斯-巴里）的传统优势，同时在邻近的拉克瓦纳县（斯克兰顿）重建民主党的更大优势。

在俄亥俄州，布朗必须在克利夫兰郊外的洛兰县重夺领先优势。他在2018年胜选时领先18.5个百分点，而2024年败选时仅领先5个百分点。（他在俄亥俄州东北部的一些县，例如扬斯敦附近的马霍宁县，也面临着同样的挑战。）在密歇根州的参议员和州长竞选中，自20世纪80年代以来就以蓝领“里根民主党人”的聚集地而闻名的麦库姆县，对民主党人来说是一个至关重要的机会：该县在特朗普的三次竞选中都坚定地支持了他，但在特朗普没有参选时，则倾向于其他民主党候选人，例如即将卸任的州长格雷琴·惠特默。夏洛特西北部的卡托巴县增添了一丝南方特色，这里的白人福音派基督徒比北部蓝领基督徒多得多：该县通常为共和党带来 40 个百分点的优势，但民主党参议员候选人罗伊·库珀在 2020 年州长选举中获胜，将这一优势缩小了约 10 个百分点。

密歇根州立大学美国社区项目主任但丁·钦尼表示，这些蓝领社区的大多数选民“并非意识形态选民；他们只是觉得游戏规则对他们不利，需要有人来改革这个体制”。他指出，正是这种信念在过去十年里将他们中的许多人推向了特朗普。但钦尼说，现在“他们中的很多人觉得，‘他说过要解决所有问题，但他没有，我也很生气。’”

Daniel Acker/Bloomberg/Getty Images/文件

在特朗普时代，美国农村地区一直是共和党的最后一道防线。但即使是这道堡垒也可能出现裂缝。

特朗普的政策从多方面挤压了农村经济。关税提高了农机和其他关键农业投入品的成本，扰乱了出口市场。伊朗战争推高了燃料和化肥的价格。去年预算协调法案中削减的医疗补助计划威胁到农村医院的生存。移民执法突袭行动扰乱了肉类加工厂的运转。“所有这些政策都严重损害了农村选民的利益，”堪萨斯州立大学政治学教授纳撒尼尔·伯克黑德说道。伯克黑德指出，与以往的农业危机不同，农民们可以将他们的压力直接归咎于特朗普“选择实施”的政策——而众议院和参议院的共和党人也曾多次投票支持这些政策。

尽管如此，特朗普政府仍在向农民提供巨额联邦补贴，同时还从预算协调法案的专项资金中拨出款项用于农村医院。而农村选民或许是最容易接受共和党针对民主党的文化论调的群体。

对民主党人来说，想要翻盘特朗普以巨大优势赢得的那些农村县是不现实的。他们的目标是尽可能减少败局。哈里斯2024年竞选团队的摇摆州负责人丹·坎宁表示，在农村人口众多的州，如果共和党人“不是以40个百分点的优势赢得20个农村县，而是只以18个百分点的优势获胜”，那么民主党人获胜的概率就会大大提高。

民主党能否缩小共和党在传统农村地区的领先优势，值得关注的几个地区包括：堪萨斯州西南部的福特县（道奇城是该县的肉类加工中心）；俄亥俄州西部的达克县（该县以玉米、大豆、鸡肉和鸡蛋为主）；威斯康星州西南边界的格兰特县（该县是乳制品、玉米和大豆种植中心）；以及爱荷华州东部的斯科特县（该县主要生产玉米、大豆和生猪）。除福特县（该县拉丁裔人口众多）外，这些县的居民绝大多数是白人，收入中位数低于全国平均水平；除斯科特县外，这些县的大学毕业生人数也远低于平均水平。

在这些通常支持共和党的地区，“关键在于投票率，”爱荷华州西北部乡村地区《暴风湖时报》的编辑阿特·库伦说道。“（今年）你几乎看不到共和党的竞选标语和巨大的特朗普竞选标语。标语本身意义不大，但它们确实是衡量选民热情的一个相当不错的晴雨表。”

距离大选仅剩一个多月，关键的动态并非共和党在任何一个选民群体中面临更大的脆弱性，而是随着民众对特朗普第二个任期的不满情绪日益高涨，共和党必须同时巩固其在所有选民群体中的地位。今年的关键选战几乎全部发生在传统的共和党票仓，而这些票仓中最“红”的地区在选举日之前自然可能会重新倒向共和党。但这仍然给共和党留下了一片需要巩固的广阔战场——而且时间紧迫。