Following in his dad’s footsteps, Michael O’Brien hopes to open a business after graduating from the University of Iowa. O’Brien, however, is worried the state of the economy will hinder him from accomplishing this dream. 

For him, along with millions of Americans, Donald Trump is the answer. 

The 19-year-old and second-year UI student cast his ballot on Election Day for Trump. He said he aligns with Trump’s views on business. 

“I feel like Donald Trump helps business owners,” O’Brien said. “He likes to cut back on taxes and everything, so I felt like that was the most beneficial for my family.”

These sentiments are not only felt in the state of Iowa. After taking on credit card debt, selling gold to boost her income, and moving to a rural town in Wisconsin for cheaper rent, Sarah Butke is also eager to see economic change. 

The 38-year-old Elkhorn, Wisconsin, resident is paying off six credit cards and moved to the small town because her rent in Waukesha, a suburb of Milwaukee, was no longer financially feasible. 

Butke voted for Trump in hopes his policies will relieve some of her financial burdens.

“I believe that he is the one to lead our country and get us back on track,” Butke said. “Man, times have been tough. My boyfriend and I feel it.”  

Living paycheck to paycheck, Butke said she bargain shops, racks up reward points, and clips coupons, but it does little to lessen the number at the bottom of her grocery store receipt. 

The majority of voters felt similarly to Butke and O’Brien, voting with the economy on their minds as they grappled with inflation and high prices driving up the cost of everyday essentials. Political scientists and Iowans across the state say the vote for Trump came down to the economy. 

Exit polling by AP VoteCast reported that 39 percent of voters surveyed said the economy was their top issue as they cast their ballots. 

Deep economic discontent with President Joe Biden and everyday price concerns, such as Butke’s, helped Trump return to the White House for a second term. 

The president-elect tapped into voters’ deep anxieties about the economy. Those worried about the economy generally voted for Trump. He made inroads among Americans who ranked the economy and their resulting financial stress as a top issue in the 2024 election. 

Here in Iowa, Trump’s message hit home. 

Trump won the Hawkeye state by his largest margin yet — over 13 percentage points. All of the state’s 99 counties swung right, with Iowans giving Trump 56 percent of the vote, securing him the state’s six electoral votes.

Trump won the state in 2016 against Democrat Hillary Clinton by nine points, and again in 2020 by eight points against Biden. He won the Iowa Republican caucuses by the highest the contest has ever seen — 30 percentage points.

Inflation coupled with rising prices heightened voters’ concerns. Currently, inflation is at a three-year low and economic forecasters express no major concern with its current state; however, inflation flared to a four-decade high under the Biden administration. 

Biden’s annual inflation rates equated to 5.4 percent, while they were 1.9 percent under Trump, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index. Inflation reached over 20 percent during the first 45 months of Biden’s term, which Biden blamed on COVID-19’s lingering effects and the Russia-Ukraine war. 

The annual inflation rate for the U.S. was 2.6 percent for October compared to a rate of 2.4 percent in September, according to U.S. Labor Department data published on Nov. 13. This number approaches the U.S. Federal Reserve’s target inflation rate of 2 percent. 

Though the inflation rate has fallen, the COVID-19 pandemic fueled costs to soar higher in a lasting way that has put homeownership out of reach for many Americans, pushed up rental costs, and made the price of essentials such as gas and groceries a burden on Americans’ pocketbooks. 

Only a tenth of Americans rate the economy as “very good,” according to an October CBS News/YouGov poll of registered voters taken before the election. Gallup found in an October poll over half of Americans say their families are worse off today than they were four years ago. 

Trump angled his campaign to needle at these worries, fleshing out voters’ anxieties and tactically swaying their votes for not only himself but Republicans down the ballot. 

Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign pitch on the economy — while favored by almost two dozen Nobel-prize winning economists — did not resonate with the American electorate. The issues she centered on, like reproductive freedom and concern for democracy, fell flat in comparison to the potency of the economy as an issue this election cycle. 

Trump’s messaging on the economy, combined with the public’s distrust of the Democratic Party on the issue, resulted in his massive win of the Oval Office. 

Economic anxiety boosted Trump

Groups who placed family budgets as a higher priority than the issues Harris highlighted, like reproductive freedom, swung hard for Trump on Election Day. 

Trump’s economic plans appealed to lower-income voters, middle-income voters, and voters without college degrees — all of whom placed their family budget as a top issue — according to an AP VoteCast Exit Poll of more than 12,000 voters nationwide. 

The survey found these voters were twice as likely to cast a ballot for Trump than Harris, and roughly 60 percent of voters who said the economy and jobs were the most important issue facing Americans voted for the former president. 

The issue was especially potent in Iowa.

A September Des Moines Register/Mediacom poll found 46 percent of Hawkeye voters feel they are worse off financially compared to four years ago. Fifty-seven percent of Iowa voters feel Trump would handle inflation and the economy better than Harris.

Harris’ hyper-focus on abortion rights and the future of democracy resonated with college graduates and higher-income voters, but Trump’s white-knuckled grip on his base and marginal gains among some of Democrats’ core constituencies clinched his win.

This time around, Trump also improved his performance with independent voters. The key swing voter bloc largely favors Democrats, and just over half voted for Harris; however, roughly 45 percent of independent voters cast their ballot for Trump, according to Edison Research exit polling data. 

This jump was a four percentage point improvement from Trump’s 2020 campaign. According to the data, independents accounted for a larger share of voters in the presidential election than Democrats. Trump’s gains within the voting group boosted his win. 

Reporters at The Daily Iowan conducted exit polling for responses from local voters. Among them, independents discussed their sway to Republican candidates.

An independent voter from Iowa City, Steven Kniffen, voted for Trump because he hopes to see the Republicans make a positive economic impact.

Kniffen said he is worried about where the economy is going; he thinks a second term for Trump will alleviate the financial burden Americans are experiencing. 

First-time independent voter and third-year University of Iowa student, Aidan Schrader, also favored the former president’s economic plan. As a college student, Schrader said he is concerned with where his money is going, how best to earn it, and how the government spends his tax dollars. 

Schrader is also hopeful tariffs will help. The president-elect has proposed a 60 percent tariff on goods from China and a tariff of up to 20 percent on everything else the U.S. imports. 

“His tariffs, I think, are going to have a better impact on our country,” Schrader said, a topic that has caused a great deal of debate around the country among economists, trade analysts, and business owners/corporate watchdogs. 

UI political science professor Timothy Hagle said “kitchen table issues,” such as the job market and the economy, are more important to independent voters because they directly affect them. 

Hagle said the tangibility and concreteness of the economy made the issue more potent to voters. 

“You go to the gas pump, you see what gas prices are, you go to the grocery store, you see what the prices are there, and it’s still hurting you,” Hagle said. “The Harris campaign really wasn’t able to get past that, and it was easy for the Trump campaign to simply say ‘Hey, what’s your bill look like when you go to the store?’ And so other issues that would come up tended to not be as important.” 

Dissatisfaction with Democrats

Nationally, the share of people saying they have been worse off under the current administration is the highest in presidential exit polls, reaching 45 percent of those who responded, according to ABC News. This high surpassed those who said they were worse off in 2008, in the jaws of the Great Recession. 

Of those polled, 72 percent of voters said they were dissatisfied or angry with the direction the country is heading. Voter dissatisfaction, combined with Biden’s low approval ratings, ultimately sunk Harris’ campaign. 

Hagle said Harris did not do a good job of dealing with this anger toward the incumbency and allowed Trump’s campaign to emphasize and capitalize on voter dissatisfaction. 

Biden’s approval rating swooped to a near-record low in his 13th quarter, according to Gallup News. The president averaged a 38.7 percent job approval rating during his 13th quarter from Jan. 20 to April 19. This is a record-low rating for presidents elected to their first term since Dwight D. Eisenhower took office in 1953.

Courtney Nava, an assistant professor of political science at Grinnell College, said Harris’ campaign, which only lasted 107 days, did not have enough time to address this dissatisfaction and distance her from Biden. 

“It’s really, really hard for a sitting vice president to credibly distance themselves from the administration for which they are a part,” Nava said. “That’s almost impossible.” 

Nava said voters favoring a Republican not only for the presidency, but across federal and state elections was likely not because of the party’s specific stances, but rather because of the electorate’s anger at the incumbent Democratic party. 

“I’m not sure that their specific stances were that appealing so much as people were mad at the incumbent,” she said. 

Nava said Trump’s economic stance largely balances on tariffs, which historically increase inflation. 

“We know tariffs increase inflation, and so I don’t think that [voters] were really drawn to those areas of specific policy,” Nava said. “I think that they were mad at the incumbent.”

Chad Miller, 50, of North Liberty, said he cast his ballot for Trump on Election Day because he wants to see America go back to the way it was when Trump was running things. 

“I don’t trust [Harris],” Miller said. “I don’t trust the Democratic Party. They’ve taken this party, and they’ve crashed it.” 

Trump’s message ‘digestible’ to voters

Iowa State University political science professor Mack Shelley said Trump and Republicans were able to successfully provide basic, simple answers to complex political problems, such as the economy. 

“There’s kind of a general sense in politics, if you have to explain something in great detail, you’ve lost,” Shelley said. “If you can say something and everybody has this sort of a gut level reaction and says, ‘Oh, yeah, I know what that is,’ then that helps your case.” 

Trump’s economic policies laid out on the campaign trail remained broad but resonated heavily with voters. His array of ideas sprawled from providing tax relief, cutting prices, increasing tariffs, and strengthening the economy. 

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The president-elect plans to roll out a series of targeted tax breaks, including eliminating federal taxes on tips, overtime pay, and Social Security benefits. Harris’ campaign outlined tax cuts for middle-class families, a plan to provide first-time homebuyers with up to $25,000 to assist with down payments, and a strengthening of Social Security and Medicare. 

Twenty-three Nobel Prize-winning economists signed a letter deeming Harris’ economic plan “vastly superior” to Trump’s.  However, overwhelmingly, the American electorate preferred Trump’s plan. 

Shelley, who has earned two advanced degrees studying economics, said tariffs will neither fix inflation nor make the national economy more competitive, as Trump communicates to voters. Although, Shelley said, Trump’s simple solution to a complex situation is very appealing to voters. 

Shelley said if public perception hadn’t been stoked against current levels of inflation, it is possible that Harris’ strategy would have resonated better with voters. 

“They trust what Donald Trump says, and the message they’re getting from Trump is relatively easy to digest,” Shelley said. 

Other issues fell flat

Abortion access after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade’s long-standing protections and concern for democracy ranked high in exit polling, but both issues lost their influence on Election Day.

Concern for democracy was a primary driver among voters who cast their ballots for Harris, according to AP VoteCast. Harris’ messaging set a clear divide between what a future would look like under her or her opponent; she painted a bright picture and pinned joy as a common theme of her presidency. 

Harris placed abortion access and reproductive freedom at the forefront of her campaign. However, exit polling shows the economy was more influential to voters. 

Shelley said the concreteness of issues impacts how much voters care about them. The economy, inflation, and rising prices are easier to point to than the concept of democracy. 

AP’s survey found voters for Trump were more motivated by economic issues and immigration. They pegged immigration and inflation as top issues. Trump’s economic message also played into fears about taxpayer-funded resources being used to care for immigrants without legal status. 

These issues were more tangible to voters, Shelley said, than those highlighted by Harris’ campaign. 

“Something that affects your pocketbook and your ability to live basically, that’s almost for certain that they’re going to be the real driver of decisions,” Shelley said. “And that’s apparently what happened.”