63 percent of white men voted for Trump
White people elected Donald Trump
By Emma Fidel
In the run-up to Election Day, most discussion of demographics emphasized growing turnout among Latino voters and hand-wringing over whether Democrats could turn out black voters. But by early Wednesday, white voters’ resounding support for Republican Donald Trump — including a majority of white women — was the clearest trend at the voting booth.
That’s according to the results of Edison Research’s national election poll, which was collected from a sample of 24,537 respondents at 350 polling places.
The exit poll isn’t perfect — in part because it relies on human survey-takers at pre-selected precincts. In 2012, for example, it significantly oversampled black voters. And little under one-fifth of the respondents to the poll were early and absentee voters this year, when early voting turnout is expected to record an unprecedented share.
We’ll eventually get more rigorous data on who voted, and how, from the Census Bureau. But the exit poll does offer some early insights into the demographics of the electorate.
Based on this data, across the board, white people of nearly all ages, genders, and education levels chose Trump. The only exception: college-educated white women.
Whites vs. nonwhite voters
Whites made up 70 percent of voters
58 percent of all whites voted for Trump
21 percent of nonwhites voted for Trump
White men
White men made up 34 percent of voters
63 percent of them voted Trump
31 percent voted Clinton
White women
White women made up 37 percent of voters
53 percent of them voted Trump
43 percent voted Clinton
Young whites (ages 18-29)
Young white people made up 12 percent of voters
48 percent of them voted Trump
43 percent voted Clinton
In comparison, 9 percent of young blacks and 24 percent of young Latinos voted for Trump.
College-educated whites
White college graduates made up 37 percent of voters
49 percent of them voted for Trump, while 45 percent voted for Clinton.
54 percent of college-educated white men voted Trump.
45 percent of college-educated white women chose Trump, while 51 percent chose Clinton. This is the only white demographic tracked by the exit poll that Trump didn’t win.
Non-college-educated whites
Whites without a college degree made up 34 percent of voters
67 percent of them voted for Trump
Of the women in this group, 62 percent voted for Trump
And men voted 72 percent for Trump
Data for white women 18-29 and white men 18-29 weren’t reported.
