Can Jewish voters decide the election

Brandeis Stories

Can Jewish voters decide the election?

In the run-up to the presidential election, Brandeis Stories asked university faculty to provide expert analysis and insight into how the candidates might address pressing issues facing the country.

By Len Saxe
October 17, 2024

Donald Trump has said that Jews will be to blame if he loses the election and that, unless he is elected, Israel will be annihilated. Whatever one's political commitments, these comments should be understood as evocative of long-standing antisemitic views of Jewish control and Jewish self-interest.

Yet, if we set aside the toxic and stereotypical element, is there any truth to the idea that Jewish voters could determine the outcome of the 2024 presidential election? Given the margins in the two previous elections, it is certainly possible. Jewish voters tend to vote in large numbers (perhaps 80% or more of Jewish adults) and, while Jews represent only 2.4% of the overall U.S. population, in several of the 2024 battleground states their numbers are large enough to swing the election.

Jewish voters in swing states

Although the majority of American Jews live in states that are thought to be uncontested (California, Florida, New Jersey, and New York), Jews represent 2% or more of the voting age population in two states that are among the most hotly contested: Pennsylvania and Arizona.

Jewish voters in swing states

Pennsylvania's Jewish population includes 300,000 adults, nearly 3% of the state's eligible voters. In 2016, Trump won Pennsylvania by a margin of less than .7%, while in 2020, Biden took the state by a margin of 1.2%. As of 2020, more than two thirds of the state's Jewish adults identified or leaned Democratic. If 80% of Pennsylvania's Jewish voters participate in the 2024 election, a shift of even 5% in either turnout or voting patterns could have a major impact on the results.

Arizona has a smaller Jewish population than Pennsylvania, approximately 125,000 adults, slightly more than 2% of the state's eligible voters. In 2016, Trump received 90,000 more votes than Hillary Clinton (+3.5%), while in 2020, Biden won Arizona with a margin of just over 10,000 votes (+.3%). As of the 2020 election, the majority of Arizona's Jewish voters identified or leaned Democratic. Again, as in Pennsylvania, even a small shift in who votes, or in voting patterns, could shift the results in that state.

Who are Jewish voters?

If Jewish voters do have the potential to swing the election, how are they likely to vote? Although Jewish voters are not monolithic in their views on social issues or regarding the candidates they support, three times as many view themselves as liberal rather than conservative. The liberal political orientation of much of the U.S. Jewish population is a consistent finding of local Jewish community studies conducted by the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies and the data syntheses done by our Steinhardt Social Research Institute.

Jewish liberalism is also confirmed by the Pew Research Center in national studies of U.S. Jewry. A Pew study conducted just prior to the 2020 election found that more than 70% of the Jewish population identified as Democrats or were independents who leaned Democratic. The consistency of these findings should not be surprising given Jews' high propensity for having college and postgraduate degrees, which are strongly associated with liberalism and identification with the Democratic party (Pew).

Despite their general tendency to identify as liberal, American Jews are nevertheless diverse. Some have consistently liberal (or conservative) policy views. Others, like Americans in general, have a complex mix of liberal and conservative views on different political topics. In general, more religious Jews are more likely to be conservative and the least religiously engaged more likely to be liberal; even within these Jewish religious subgroups, there is considerable diversity.

One question that has been raised is whether Israel will be a central issue, perhaps pulling liberal and moderate Jewish voters away from their support of Kamala Harris. There is not a lot of data, but a set of recent studies conducted in battleground states by a pollster affiliated with the Jewish Democratic Council of America suggests that Harris has strong support and that Trump has not made inroads (71% v. 26% in a two-way vote). The issues that most concern Jewish voters are the issues of concern for all voters: the future of democracy, abortion, and the economy.

How might Jews influence the 2024 election?

Given the winner-take-all design of our electoral college system, just a small number of voters in particular states can shape the national outcome. This potential is clearly evident in Pennsylvania and Arizona, but the opportunity exists in nearly a half-dozen additional states, and perhaps others which were not considered in contention until recently. Of the larger battleground states that have been predicted to be decided by small margins, Michigan, Georgia, and North Carolina (with a total of 47 electoral votes), have significant Jewish populations, large enough to swing the election.

There is no doubt that in the contested presidential election of 2024, the Jewish vote matters. If the past is prologue to the future, they are likely to support Kamala Harris. Trump's efforts to paint himself as the savior of Israel do not appear to be making a difference. But prediction is difficult and the extent to which the voices of Jewish voters shape the outcome is a function of how close the race is in a small number of battleground states.

Leonard Saxe is the Klutznick Professor of Contemporary Jewish Studies and director of the Cohen Center for Modern Jewish Studies and the Steinhardt Social Research Institute.