Which battleground state voters could decide the election?

It’s no secret that Americans’ political sentiments are determined by race, ethnicity, education, and age. But what makes presidential elections so competitive is the way these demographic groups often balance out one another.

In 2024, this delicate balance is key to understanding which of the seven battleground states have the closest presidential contests, according to opinion polls. In past elections, several of these states were decided by fewer than 40,000 votes. Since then, they’ve added about 1.3 million potential voters, and even small changes in sentiment or turnout among certain groups could be enough to change the outcome of this election.

To better understand the demographic forces at play on the battlefield, the New York Times conducted a detailed review of the 2020 races and compared precinct-level results with census data to estimate who voted and how. We looked at race, ethnicity, age, education, and geography to identify trends and key groups in each state. (Gender is another factor that increases partisanship, but was not included in this analysis.)

What to see President Biden’s winning coalition relied heavily on Latino voters, who made up nearly a quarter of voters in 2020, and that number is likely to rise in this election. But while the state’s Latino voters generally favor Democrats, no group is a monolith.

Experts say Latinos may be persuaded to change their votes because of their weaker attachment to political parties than other non-white groups. Moreover, a significant portion of this group is comprised of young, U.S.-born Latinos who will be voting for the first time, and their emotions can be difficult to predict. Recent polls show former President Donald J. Trump making inroads with young people and voters of color.

President Trump’s biggest supporters in 2020 came from white voters over the age of 35. This group received half of the ballots, in part because of the overrepresentation of white retirees in the state.

For Democrats, that could potentially get them more votes. In 2020, more votes were cast for Democratic Senate candidates than for Biden. “Voters who voted for Mark Kelly but decided not to vote for Biden or Trump could have determined the outcome of the primary,” said Samara Clara, a political science professor at the University of Arizona.

What to see Democrats in Georgia have long followed the “30/30 rule,” a term made famous by University of Georgia political scientist Charles S. Bullock III. It states that for the Democratic Party to win, black voters must account for 30% of the total electorate, and at least 30% of white voters must vote for the Democratic Party.

Black voters, who made up nearly a third of the vote in 2020, overwhelmingly preferred Mr. Biden, nearly 90% of the time. But that reliable base of support appeared to be faltering earlier this year, a group that experts say Vice President Kamala Harris needs to reinvigorate and stimulate. About 850,000 Black Georgians did not vote in 2020.

“If turnout is poor among black voters, that will determine the fate of the Democratic candidate,” said Andra Gillespie, a political science professor at Emory University.

Both parties will also seek to appeal to the growing share of white voters with bachelor’s degrees, a group whose votes were split almost evenly between Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump in 2020.

What to see In 2020, Mr. Biden won Michigan handily, at least by the standards of the battleground state.

But President Trump did very well in the 2020 election with white residents of suburban and rural areas, who made up nearly two-thirds of the electorate.

Democrats’ strong performance among non-white voters and in Detroit’s suburbs helped erode the Republican advantage in small-town neighborhoods in 2020. But even though black voters overwhelmingly supported Mr. Biden, they were a relatively small group. It was only 14% of them. People who vote. And experts say black support for Democrats may be declining in Michigan.

“There’s definitely an attitude that they’re not represented relative to their population and their outsized role within the Democratic Party,” said Matt Grossmann, a political science professor at Michigan State University. He pointed to Detroit, a majority-black city with no black representation in Congress. “I can feel how much you care about us. And how much you take us for granted.”

The disillusionment of about 3% of Michigan voters who are Muslim and Arab American, traditionally strong Democratic constituencies, could also make a difference this year. Many of these voters have expressed anger and frustration over the Biden administration’s support of Israel in the war in Gaza, and some have said they may boycott the election or vote in favor of a third-party candidate.

What to see Across the country, education is a major political fault line, with college-educated voters much more likely to support Democrats, while less educated voters prefer Republicans. However, Nevada is a major exception to this rule. Democrats have won the last four elections in Nevada despite having a relatively low percentage of college-educated voters.

That’s because education divides the state into mostly white voters, and many of Nevada’s less educated voters are not white. Mr. Biden received half the vote in Nevada among voters without a four-year degree, an unusual feat for the state as a whole.

Inflation has taken a toll on working-class voters over the past few years, and concerns about the economy could make it easier for the Trump campaign to erode the Democratic Party’s advantage with blue-collar voters.

“Nevada is a bit of a different animal,” said David Damore, a political science professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, pointing to the state’s low voter turnout, high diversity and larger transient population. “This means there are a lot of potential untapped voters who can all be mobilized.”

What to see In 2020, North Carolina became the narrowest of the states Trump won. Rural voters, who made up nearly a fifth of the electorate, helped President Trump win.

But North Carolina also has many small cities with deep partisan divisions between city residents who lean Democratic and suburban residents who lean Republican.

If Democrats want to flip the state, they will need to lose fewer votes in rural areas and increase voter turnout in smaller cities like Greensboro and Asheville, said Chris Cooper, a political science professor at Western Carolina University.

“If we see some movement away from Trump in rural areas, that’s really important,” he said. “The map will still show those places in red, but those differences can be the difference between winning and losing.”

What to see As in other states, education plays a large role in the partisan divide in Pennsylvania. White voters without a bachelor’s degree accounted for nearly half of the total, and they supported President Trump 3 to 1 in 2020. Still, that wasn’t enough for him to win over a coalition of white voters with college degrees and voters of color. The person who gave Biden the victory.

Another big factor is geography.

Mr. Trump dominated the state’s rural areas and small towns, as well as Pittsburgh’s suburbs. But Mr. Biden had a strong showing in Pennsylvania cities and suburban Philadelphia, where he accounted for more than 40% of the 2020 vote.

There were similar geographic disparities among voters in Wisconsin. Most of the support for Mr. Trump came from the state’s more than 1,000 small towns and Milwaukee suburbs.

But the fastest-growing parts of the state are those that increasingly lean Democratic. It is a suburb of Madison, home to the main campus of the University of Wisconsin.

In 2020, voter turnout in Dane County, which includes Madison, was 89%.

“This is one of the highest voter turnout counties in the country,” said Charles Franklin, director of polling at Marquette Law School. “The question for Democrats here is, is it possible to squeeze more votes out of Dane County?”