What was Reagan's appeal to Democrats?

[SingingAnalyst]

Since no one has mentioned this yet, I suspect Mondale had no chance in 1984 among working-class white voters in Buffalo, Chicago, Cleveland, and Detroit, once this news broke:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerzy_Popie%C5%82uszko#Assassination

I was a freshman at MIT at the time, and in Cambridge I never heard a thing about this; however, I'm sure people back home in largely Polish-American Sterling Heights, Michigan, heard about it. A few days later, Reagan won 70% in Sterling Heights, 64% in Warren, 48.5% in Detroit's District 6 (which was starting to have a significant Black voter population), and even 41% in Hamtramck (slogan: A Bit of Europe in America). More evidence that politically motivated actions can have far-reaching consequences.

[SingingAnalyst]

The GI generation seems to have liked him a lot. In 1984, voters 65 and over supported him 64-36 and were the most Republican age group that year. Since they were the most Democratic age group in 1988 (Bush 51 - Dukakis 49) it's clear much of them supported him despite his party affiliation.

^^^This. Older voters seemed to like Reagan. In 1976 voters over 65 split evenly between Carter and Ford. In 1980, they voted 55/39 for Reagan over Carter.

[SingingAnalyst]

Things were shltty, and Reagan gave a compelling case for why he would make them better in a much less partisan time.  For many Americans, by 1984, he had.

Yup. Back then, if you were a good candidate and a good President, people who don't 100% agree with you may vote for you anyway. Nowadays, nope.

^^^This. After two consecutive oustings of an incumbent President (Ford in '76 and Carter in '80), many Americans I think were ready to re-elect Reagan if they felt he did even a halfway decent job.