Historically, union members have voted disproportionately for Democratic Party candidates; however, with the election of Donald Trump in 2016, as well as the subsequent midterm elections in 2018, the margin of support for Democrats narrowed among union voters while the Republican Party made significant gains.1 Observers are now questioning whether Democrats will hold onto the union vote in 2024,2 as recent polling shows Democrats’ lead among voters in union households slipping—including in swing states.3 Unions also have become less central to the political lives of many workers.4
Yet the Biden-Harris administration has been the most pro-union administration in decades. It has passed major legislation that promises to create good union jobs in construction and manufacturing. The administration has also taken numerous executive actions to protect organizing workers and make it easier to join a union, many of which are led by Vice President Kamala Harris in her role as chair of the White House Task on Worker Organizing and Empowerment.5 Conversely, the administration of former President Donald Trump took a number of steps that undermined workers’ ability to come together in unions, including: 1) appointing far-right Supreme Court justices who made it harder for workers illegally fired due to organizing activity to get back on the job,6 and 2) appointing agency leaders who made it more difficult for workers to form a union.7 Project 2025, an authoritarian playbook for the next presidential administration co-written in part by former Trump appointees, offers further instructions for dismantling agencies that protect worker organizing.8 Whether Democrats will be rewarded at the ballot box for the Biden-Harris administration’s pro-union efforts is one of the major questions to be answered in the 2024 election.
According to new analysis from the Center for American Progress Action Fund, union members have increasingly voted for Democratic Party candidates over the past two election cycles, suggesting that President Biden and Vice President Harris’ efforts to win the union vote may have been successful. Though it remains to be seen if the Biden-Harris administration’s efforts will result in greater support from union members in the 2024 election, the improved performance of the Democratic Party among union voters since 2020 offers a sign that they will.
Analysis of recent elections finds that union members supported the Democratic Party at higher levels in 2020 and 2022 during the election and presidency of the Biden-Harris administration than they did in 2016 and 2018, during Trump’s election and presidency. In fact, support in 2022 was close to levels in 2012 and 2014. Levels of support for Democrats in 2020 and 2022 increased across a range of union members, most notably workers without college degrees, white and Hispanic workers, and service-sector workers. Still, the Democratic advantage remained slim across some groups of union members, particularly the white working class.
Union members supported the Democratic Party at higher levels in 2020 and 2022 during the election and presidency of the Biden-Harris administration than they did in 2016 and 2018, during Trump's election and presidency.
More specifically, CAP Action analysis finds that:
- Democratic candidates increased their vote share among union members compared with nonunion members starting with the presidential election in 2020. Union voters preferred Democratic candidates by a 12.3 percentage point margin compared with nonunion voters in 2022 and by a 7.7 percentage point margin in 2020—higher than the margin of 4.4 percentage points in 2016 and 5.5 percentage points in 2018.
- Working-class union voters were more likely to vote for a Democratic candidate in 2020 and 2022 than in 2016 and 2018. Union workers without a four-year college degree supported Democratic candidates by a margin of 7.2 percentage points in 2022 over nonunion working-class voters, compared with a margin of less than 1 percent in 2018.
- White union voters were 12 percentage points more likely to vote for a Democratic candidate than white nonunion voters in 2022 and 8.5 percentage points more likely in 2020, compared with 4.3 percentage points more likely in 2016 and 4.7 percentage points more likely in 2018.
- Hispanic union workers have been increasingly more likely to vote for Democrats compared with Hispanic nonunion workers in every election since 2016, reaching a margin of 14.4 percentage points in 2022.
- Much of the increase in Democratic candidates’ advantage among union members has been driven in part by service-sector workers, who were 7.8 percentage points more likely to vote for a Democratic candidate in 2022 compared with nonunion service workers, but no more likely to vote for Democratic candidates in 2018.
Though it is too early to know for certain whether these trends will continue in 2024, as voters’ attitudes may have been swayed by a number of factors since the midterm elections in 2022, the Biden-Harris administration’s pro-union campaign promises and subsequent pro-worker actions may have reversed some of the inroads Republican candidates made among union voters during the first Trump campaign and presidency. As the Biden-Harris administration doubles down on its pro-worker policy agenda—and as unions have become increasingly popular, winning major organizing victories since 2022—union voter preferences may tip the scales further for Democrats in 2024.9
Union voters favored Democrats more in 2020 and 2022 than in 2016 and 2018
Union voters are more likely to support Democratic candidates than nonunion voters. In 2022, Democratic candidates had a 12.3 percentage point higher vote share among union members compared with nonunion members. (see Figure 1) This margin was far smaller in the election of Trump in 2016—just 4.4 percentage points—and it stayed small in 2018. However, the margin began to increase again in 2020 with Biden’s presidential election.
While union voters in 2016 and 2018 still preferred Democratic candidates more than nonunion voters, the extent to which union members had a higher vote share for Democratic candidates decreased in 2016 and stayed narrow during the 2018 midterms, even as overall support increased for Democratic candidates. This trend reversed during the 2020 election, when Democratic candidate Biden ran on a promise to be “the most pro-union president you’ve ever seen”;10 the subsequent support the Biden-Harris campaign received among union voters was one of the factors that secured his win in 2020, especially in some swing states.11 Michigan, Nevada, and Pennsylvania—all states the Biden-Harris ticket carried by a margin of less than 3 percent—have higher union densities than the nation overall, with at least 12 percent of workers in each state being members of labor unions.12 Furthermore, the gap between union and nonunion voters in favor of Democratic candidates widened even further in 2022. At that point, the Biden-Harris administration had achieved the passage of an industrial policy program that promised to create hundreds of thousands of union jobs; the administration had also appointed key pro-worker leaders at federal agencies, increased wages for millions of workers by increasing federal contractors’ wages and requiring wage agreements on some federal spending projects, and launched a task force that issued recommendations for more than 70 executive actions to strengthen worker organizing across the administration.13 Both Biden and Harris have supported unions from the bully pulpit, with Biden walking the picket line with striking United Auto Workers workers and Harris, who chaired the administration’s Task Force on Worker Organizing and Empowerment, joining the Service Employees International Union’s quadrennial convention as a keynote speaker.14
Why union voters prefer Democrats
Support for Democratic candidates is generally higher among union voters,15 as academic literature shows that unions increase voter turnout and can inform voter preferences.16 Empirical studies have confirmed that union members are both more likely to vote than nonunion members and typically more likely to favor Democrats, directly tying Democratic electoral performance to union strength.17 Not only do labor unions increase voter turnout, but also, counties with higher shares of union members were less likely to vote for Republican candidates in past presidential elections.18 One study found that “right-to-work” laws, which reduce union membership, shrunk county-level Democratic presidential vote shares in elections from 1980 to 2016 by 3.5 percentage points compared with border counties with no right-to-work laws; they also lowered voter turnout by 2 percentage points.19
Additionally, union voters who support worker-oriented policies are more likely to vote for their union’s endorsed candidate,20 union members prefer candidates they perceive as being advocates for the working class,21 and labor unions offer financial support for elected officials who further pro-worker causes.22 These officials are more likely to be Democrats. Finally, unions are effective at elevating working-class voices into elected offices, as unions support members running for office, and states with more union voters favor more candidates from jobs with high unionization rates.23
All these things suggest that unions strengthen the link between pro-worker attitudes and votes for pro-labor candidates. White union members also score much lower than their nonunion counterparts on survey questions used to gauge racial resentment.24 This suggests that unions could help decrease the potential to be swayed by the narratives of white racial grievance that Trump and other Republicans promoted during previous election campaigns.25
Union and nonunion working-class voters
A similar trend as played out among all voters has also occurred among working-class voters. The Democratic advantage among union working-class voters compared with nonunion working-class voters nearly disappeared in 2016 and 2018; it then increased from 2020 to 2022, reaching a margin of 7.2 percentage points. (see Figure 2)
The working class—defined as individuals without a four-year college degree—makes up a majority of the electorate.26 As a result, presidential candidates in both 2016 and 2020 made explicit pitches to the working class, and in the case of the Biden-Harris ticket, to working-class union members in particular. Since winning the 2020 election, the Biden-Harris administration has further centered the working class in its signature jobs and infrastructure investments, spending billions of dollars in an effort to create well-paying union jobs that are accessible to workers without four-year college degrees.27 Support for Democratic candidates among working-class union voters increased in 2022, a possible signifier that the Biden administration’s major industrial policy investments are resulting in electoral gains among union members.
Union and nonunion voters of color
In the 2020 and 2022 elections, white and Hispanic union voters alike increasingly supported Democrats compared with nonunion voters. There was little change among Black union members and union members of other or multiple races or ethnicities, who overwhelmingly support Democratic candidates. The 2016 election saw the favorability of Democrats decrease among white and Hispanic union voters compared with their nonunion counterparts. Researchers and commentators see white voters, and the white working class in particular, as crucial to Trump’s victory in 2016 and as the core of his base today28—and Republicans managed to improve their performance among Hispanics starting in 2016.29 However, the 2020 election was the beginning of an increase in support for Democratic candidates among white and Hispanic union voters compared with their nonunion counterparts, and the gap further widened in 2022. That year, a larger percentage of white union voters voted for a Democratic candidate than did white nonunion voters, by 12 percentage points, meaning Democratic candidates received a total of 56.9 percent of white union votes in 2022. This difference was only 4.3 percentage points in 2016. Among Hispanic union workers in 2022, Democratic candidates won 14.4 percentage points more of the vote compared with nonunion Hispanic workers.
The increase in support among white voters is not universal: Among white workers without college degrees, there was very little difference between union and nonunion voters in the 2020 and 2022 elections, as was the case in 2016 and 2018. Furthermore, among Black voters, the gap between union and nonunion support for Democrats has been very small since 2012, and support among nonunion Black voters for Democrats was slightly higher than support among union Black voters in 2018 and 2020. These small differences are likely due to the already high vote shares for Democratic candidates among Black voters, which never fell below 80 percent in the years analyzed. The differences between union and nonunion vote shares for Democrats are similarly small among voters of other or multiple non-Hispanic races or ethnicities, though their overall support is lower than among Black voters. Nevertheless, white and Hispanic union members appear increasingly receptive to the Democrats’ alternative to Republican messaging since President Biden’s election in 2020.
Union and nonunion service-sector workers
Starting in 2020, Democratic candidates had an increasingly higher vote gain among union members in service occupations compared with nonunion service workers. This trend was a component of the growth in support for Democrats since Biden’s election in 2020 among union members compared with nonunion members. The Biden administration has taken a number of steps to support workers and the right to unionize in service occupations, including increasing wages for service workers on federal contracts and strengthening union organizing rules that make it easier for workers in the service industry to form unions.30 This support may pay dividends at the ballot box owing to the large numbers of service workers in the electorate: Four out of every five American workers in the private sector work in services, and the service sector is one of the major employers of workers who do not have college degrees.31
The Biden-Harris administration’s support for working people in other sectors of the economy may hold further electoral awards for Democrats. In the construction sector—which saw a 41 percent increase in job openings in 2023, driven in no small part by the infrastructure investments passed by the administration—the Democratic advantage among union workers rose to 18.6 percentage points in 2022.32 Yet as this was a midterm election cycle and no similar bump occurred in 2020, it remains to be seen whether this marks the beginning of a longer-term trend.
Conclusion
In 2016, the election of Donald Trump lessened the effect of union membership on the likelihood of voting for Democratic candidates. The election of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris reversed this trend in 2020, resulting in union members once again preferring Democratic candidates by wide margins compared with nonunion voters, especially among the working class and white, Hispanic, and service worker voters. Biden campaigned on a promise to promote union jobs, and the Biden-Harris administration has since made highly visible overtures to union members and the working class, passing landmark investments in union jobs and taking a number of steps to protect workers’ right to organize. Democratic candidates’ promises on the campaign trail and in office likely led to the increase in union support for Democrats in 2020 and 2022, and these efforts to protect unions may further pay off in 2024.
Methodology
This analysis relies on the 2012 to 2022 samples of the Cooperative Election Study, formerly the Cooperative Congressional Election Study.33 This survey, conducted during each election year, offers demographic and voting data on voters cross-checked against records of verified voters to produce a representative sample of voters for each election. This analysis uses only voters validated with Catalist and TargetSmart lists of registered voters, and it is restricted to employed voters to ensure the union and nonunion populations are as comparable as possible.
Results are reported in this brief as the difference in the proportion of total votes for any candidate, including third-party candidates, among a union subpopulation for the Democratic presidential candidate. During midterm elections, results are reported as the difference in the proportion of total votes for a candidate for House of Representatives compared with the proportion of votes for the Democratic candidate among nonunion voters. Service workers are defined as all workers in service industries, which excludes agriculture and mining, construction, manufacturing, and public administration workers. Hispanic workers are defined as workers who identified as being “of Spanish, Latino, or Hispanic origin or descent,” and to avoid double-counting respondents, white, Black, and other or multiple race or ethnicity voters only include non-Hispanic respondents.
Exit polls of voters confirm similar results. The National Election Pool, a consortium of several major news organizations, found that union households favored Democratic candidates by a margin of 18 points in 2012,34 8 points in 2016,35 and 16 points in 2020.36