In the run-up to the election, Donald Trump successfully convinced a historic number of younger, Black, and Latino voters that he was the best option. Some are now second-guessing their decision. This episode was produced by Miles Bryan, edited by Jolie Myers, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Patrick Boyd and Andrea Kristinsdottir, and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. Transcript at vox.com/today-explained-podcast. Sharita White, a former Democrat who voted for Donald Trump last year, at her rowhouse home in Philadelphia. Photo by Christian Paz for Vox. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the central question about Trump's voter base in this episode?
On Today Explained, we're asking if any of his voters are experiencing voters remorse, especially those ones who are newer to his winning coalition. Younger voters, black voters, Latin voters. We're heading to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to ask them if regrets. Do they have a few? And just by way of spoiler to get this out of the way, the answer is yes, they do.
And he takes the fat, the fat shot drug.
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Today Explained. My name is Sean Ramos for my work at Vox. And so does Christian Paz. Christian, we had you on in September of 2024 for an episode about the presidential race titled How to Win Pennsylvania. Turns out... Donald Trump won Pennsylvania.
How did he do it? Yeah, so he didn't just flip the state. He actually won it by a bigger margin than he did in 2016. That's because across almost every county, every demographic group, every region, he made significant inroads. But Philadelphia itself was drastic. It got nearly five points more Republican than in 2020. Hmm.
And a lot of that is because he did historically well with voters that have traditionally voted for Democrats. One of those voters is a woman named Sherita White. Producer Miles Bryan and I actually met her before the election at an event called Black Voters for Trump outside of a cheesesteak place in North Philly.
That's why I say when Trump was in the chair, black people was up. And I want Trump back in the chair because I've been struggling ever since he's been out of the chair.
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Chapter 2: Who is Sharita White and why is her story important?
So she told us that during Trump's first term, things were good. But then during the Biden years, everything got worse. Her husband died. She lost her job, then her house. And now she's living in a neighborhood called Kensington, which is kind of known for being an open air drug market.
When my kids leave out of their door every day, they have to see needles. They have to see junkies.
Yeah, I've been there once. It's rough. Yeah. And then she said that inflation made everything more expensive. And Trump's messaging was clear and simple. Vote for him to bring prices down. And so she did. And now with Trump a few months into his term, we figured we'd ask her, how are things going? Have you seen prices go down?
No, not at all. I just see things just keep rising and stuff and things does not look like they're not getting better and stuff.
When you go to the grocery store what do you like buy that you notice?
Like eggs, milk, bag of chicken. I know it was like probably like $7.99 or $8.99 but now it's like $12.99 or something like that.
Okay, so Sherita is noticing the prices. We heard a lot of people were noticing the prices last year, and that was influencing their vote. Is she noticing anything the Trump administration is doing since the election, since inauguration?
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Chapter 3: What are Sharita White’s experiences and concerns since voting for Trump?
Yeah, so Sharita told us that she doesn't pay close attention to the news. She catches some stuff on social media.
I just know people talking over the internet, like Facebook, Instagram.
But some of the general chaos of the first few months of Trump has managed to filter its way to her. And it's freaking her out.
When I heard all the stuff that's going on, I just got a little bit worried. Like the stuff that they were saying that Donald Trump was trying to do, like as far as like taking, like I'm not on Section 8, but a lot of my family members is on there. So I was worried about that. Like I heard he was trying to cut like Social Security, SSI, and stuff like that.
When did you start to feel worried about that? So when I started hearing like family members talking about it and stuff like that. Right. And stuff like that.
Sharita's kids get their dad's Social Security payments, and one of her sons has Crohn's disease. So hearing these rumors that Trump was going to make big cuts to Social Security or other government services has unsettled her. Now, important thing to note here is she emphasized that she wasn't sure that any of this stuff was happening.
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Chapter 4: How is inflation and the economy affecting Trump voters like Sharita?
See, I want to get my facts. I don't know if they're true or not because I'm not sure.
But she was still hearing about it from friends and relatives on Facebook, and that's where the worries come from.
I heard there is going to be a lot of people homeless in 2026. And I'm like, you know, if this do happen, I will be one of those people.
OK, so she's unsettled. But is she having voters remorse?
Yeah. So she is feeling some regrets.
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Chapter 5: What worries does Sharita have about Social Security and government support?
People will say, oh, I wish I would never wrote for Trump and stuff like that. I didn't want to live that way, too.
Basically, she was telling us the more that she thinks about it and the more that time passes, she regrets that vote. Poll after poll, what Sharita is saying, it's a recurring picture where you have not very Trumpy kind of marginal Trump voters who seem to be the most upset with his presidency so far in that Trump coalition.
It doesn't mean that all of them want to redo their votes, but it does suggest something for Republicans in the future that they can't necessarily count on that Trump coalition anymore. Like the most recent Pew Research Center study found that from February to April of this year, Trump's approval among his own voters declined about six points.
Trump supporters, strong Trump supporters, they're mostly sticking with him. But non-MAGA soft supporters, those are the ones that are really turning on him.
Did you talk to anyone else like Sherita in the ever-important state of Pennsylvania while you were there?
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Chapter 6: Are some Trump voters experiencing regret or remorse over their vote?
Yeah, so while we were out and about in Philly, Miles and I went looking for some of these voters, those who might be starting to drift out of the Trump coalition. They weren't hard to find.
Us, we were betrayed. We voted for Trump. And Trump betrayed us. Because the truth is, people voted for one thing. The economy. A good economy. And these tariffs are hiking everything up. Up my ass. I'm struggling in big letters. And whites, too. They're struggling. Plain and simple.
OK, so this guy is feeling it. Yeah, yeah. Kensington, where Sherita lives, has a big Puerto Rican Dominican population. And we ran into Jose just like a block down from her house. He's in his early 60s. He said he's retired, but occasionally works as a handyman. And he told us he's voted Democrat for years, ever since he became a U.S. citizen.
But he voted for Trump last year because he wanted prices to come down.
And what goes up is not coming down.
The only thing coming down are the planes. The prices, they just keep rising. Oh, man.
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Chapter 7: Who else did the producers talk to in Philadelphia, and what are their views?
Jose needs his own late-night comedy show. It was so fun to talk to him. But he got serious, too. He said it's more than just economics. He was all for Trump's immigration plans. He... He liked Trump's pitch about deporting criminals, but that's not what he's seeing in practice.
The hard workers, he's kicking them out. The ones that don't work, he's letting them be. How does that make sense? It's all right that he picks up the delinquents. I'm all for that. But those that aren't doing anything wrong, leave them alone. That's all I have to say.
What Jose was telling us is something that the data is reflecting, too, that there were and are plenty of Black and Latino people, especially in cities, who believe Trump's pitch about closing the border, about being tougher on crime, including crime by undocumented immigrants. But the reality has been different.
And a lot of the people that are getting caught up in Trump's immigration actions don't have a record of violent crimes. That's not necessarily what these voters thought they were going to get from Trump. And it's a good example of what we're seeing with these new Trump voters, where they like some of his ideas in theory, but the execution isn't really what they were expecting.
Chapter 8: How do Latino voters like Jose perceive Trump's immigration policies?
This one in particular gets me from Jose because it's not that surprising that Donald Trump, like the king of purporting to want to deport everyone who doesn't fit his, you know, ideal of an American, is deporting everyone he possibly can and maybe not even legally can.
Yeah, it's interesting here because Jose's not alone that there are folks who maybe heard bits and pieces of information, depending on their information and media diet, that at times were conflicting, right? Because plenty of folks in the Trump realm and campaign would say, obviously, mass deportations now, but at the same time would say, But we're going to start and focus on violent criminals.
We're going to start and focus with members of international, transnational gangs. And so there's maybe a chance that some of these voters heard some things that they believed, that they didn't believe, what they wanted to believe. And now that they're saying it in practice, it's not exactly aligning with what they thought they were going to get. And it's more than just immigration.
It expands to a whole bunch of things.
A whole bunch of things when we're back. This is Today Explained.
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