CNN data analyst Harry Enten expressed his surprise at new polling data showing former President Donald Trump continuing to gain ground with black voters in his bid to retake the White House in 2024.
Looking at a polling aggregate during a CNN segment on Monday, Enten noted President Joe Biden had the support of 86 percent of black voters during the same point in the 2020 presidential race, whereas he now has the support of 70 percent of black voters.
By comparison, at this point in 2020, Trump had the support of 7 percent of black voters, whereas in the current presidential race, he holds the support of around 21 percent of black voters, which is a voting block that has heavily favored Democrats in recent decades.
“I keep looking for this to change, to go back to a historical norm and it, simply put, has not yet,” Enten said.
The CNN analyst noted that the polling data not only shows that Democrats are losing black voter support but that Trump is picking up some of that support.
“We’re careening towards a historic performance for a Republican presidential candidate, the likes of which we have not seen in six decades,” Enten continued.
READ MORE: Trump takes huge lead over Biden in swing state, poll shows
Enten noted that the shift in support among black voters is more pronounced when also factoring in age. While Biden’s support from black voters over the age of 50 had only fallen from 83 percent to 74 percent since 2020, black voters under 50 had shifted 43 points in the polling aggregate from 80 percent support for Biden in 2020 to 37 percent support today.
“I’m like speechless because you always look at history and you go, ‘Okay, this is a historic moment,'” Enten said. “If this polling is anywhere near correct, we’re looking at a historic moment right now, where black voters under the age of 50, which have historically been such a big part of the democratic coalition, are leaving in droves.”
The CNN analyst also noted a recent New York Times/Siena College poll of battleground states, showing Biden’s black voter support at around 63 percent and Trump’s support at 23 percent in a two-way race. When accounting for a three-way contest with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the poll showed Biden’s black voter support falling below 50 percent. The Democrat incumbent enjoyed 49 percent black voter support in a three-way battleground state contest, while Trump saw a less severe drop in Black voter support at 14 percent and Kennedy held 11 percent.
