While President Trump continues to challenge the legitimacy of the this month's election and President-elect Biden begins the transition effort, the election has provided some interesting data points that election data wonks and otherwise political junkies can pore over for months to come.
Death of the Bellwethers
Several counties across the US have been excellent bellwethers in recent elections, voting for the ultimate winner of the election (in the electoral college, not necessarily in the popular vote). The most accurate one was Vigo County, Indiana, home of Terra Haute, which has voted for the winner of the presidency in every election from 1956 on.
Until 2020.
And it wasn't alone. In fact, most notable bellwether counties failed to predict Joe Biden's win. Hidalgo County, NM has predicted all elections successfully since 1972, but voted for Trump this year. Other counties that failed included Essex County, VT, Westmoreland County, VA, Coos County, NH, and Darlington County, SC, all of which voted for Trump in 2016 and in 2020.
Successful bellwether counties included Blaine County, MT, Kent County, DE, and Clallam County, WA, all which voted for Biden this year after voting for Trump in 2016.
So why the shift? These counties tend to be low-population with a rural character, areas in which Trump has performed well and have been shifting towards Republicans for years. In the case of Kent County, Delaware, while it is the least populous county in the state, it contains the state capital of Dover and is in Biden's home state. Vigo County, Indiana, meanwhile seems to be swinging towards Republicans. It was not particularly close in either 2016 or 2020, and voted for a Republican governor for the first time in decades.
In conclusion, the failure of the bellwethers the cycle may be a one-off, or a signal of a long term political shift.
Longtime Republican Counties Turning Blue
Orange County, CA made news in 2016 after voting for Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump, making the former secretary of state the first Democrat to win the county since 1936. Orange County for years was synonymous with Southern Californian conservatism and was the bedrock of Republican support in the Golden State.
The affluent suburban shift to Democrats over the past few cycles accelerated under Trump, with Orange County perhaps the most visible example. Orange County shifted even more Democratic in 2020 in the presidential race, though two Orange County House seats flipped back to the Republicans after being taken by Democrats in 2018 (these two seats were handily won by incumbent Republicans in 2016).
Other traditionally Republican counties shifted Blue for the first time in decades. Duval County, FL, which is essentially conterminous with Jacksonville, voted Republican for the first time since 1976. Duval went for Trump in 2016, but voted for Democratic candidates for the Senate and the governorship in 2018. Likewise for Seminole County, FL a suburban county outside Orlando, which voted Democrat in a presidential election for the first time since 1948.
Even more dramatic was Riley County, KS, home of Manhattan and Kansas State University. The county voted Democratic for the first time ever. While Riley County has voted Democratic (sometimes by large margins) in state races, its strong Union sympathies set the stage to keep the county Republican for a century and a half.
Tarrant County, TX, home of Fort Worth, voted Democratic (albeit by less than 1%) for the first time since 1956. Maricopa County, AZ, home of Phoenix, went blue for the first time since 1948. These were the last counties with over 1 million people to have voted Republican in 2016.
Oklahoma County, OK, home of Oklahoma City, remained Republican by only 1.1 percentage points. In 2016 the county voted Republican by 10.5%, though third parties won 7.1% that cycle. This time around it was only 2.7%.
In all these counties, the blue trend mostly comes from the shift in college-educated voters voting more Democratic, while Republicans have found a new base among voters without college degrees.
Republican Surprise in Hispanic-Majority Areas of Texas
South Texas, with strong Hispanic majorities in most counties, has been an ancestrally Democratic region, rarely supporting Republicans since statehood. While Biden held on to the most populous counties of Hidalgo (home of McAllen and Edinburg) and Cameron (Brownsville and Harlingen), its margins in both counties were diminished from 2016, moving against the predominant Democratic shift (to a varying degree) across most counties in the US from 2016. E
Even more dramatic were the results in less populous but even more Hispanic counties such as Zapata and Starr. Zapata voted Republican for the first time in 2016, with Trump besting Biden by 5.5 points. Starr remained in the Democratic column, with Biden winning by 5.1 points, though Clinton beat Trump by 60.2 pints in 2016, a 55.1 swing to the Republicans, the largest in the nation.
Traditionally Democratic-leaning counties of Val Verde (in West Texas, home of Del Rio), Jim Wells (home of Alice), Reeves (also in West Texas), LaSalle, and Frio all flipped GOP this cycle. Other Democratic counties like Maverick (home of Eagle Pass) and Webb (Laredo) remained Democratic with reduced margins.
Trump's performance likely helped Tony Gonzalez keep Will Hurd's seat for the GOP in Texas's 23rd Congressional District and likely nearly flipped Texas's 15th (based in McAllen), which no national observers had rated competitive.
A similar circumstance occurred in 2004 with George Bush's landslide victory in the state, even narrowly carrying Cameron, which Trump failed to do this time around. Bush's strong showing in this part of the state likely derives from the favorite son effect and his strong showing among Hispanics. Trump also performed relatively strongly with Hispanics in 2020, and it remains to be seen whether these results indicate a long-term shift to the GOP or was a one-off event.
Trump's Improvement Among Hispanics Nationally
Exit polls have Trump winning around 32-36% of the Hispanic vote, better than the approximately 29% he received in 2016.
In Miami-Dade County, FL, home to Miami, Trump dramatically improved his performance among Hispanics from 2016, especially among Cuban-Americans. While he did not win this large county of 2.7 million, his losing margin was only approximately 7 points, versus the 29 point margin by which he lost in 2016. A similar but much smaller improvement for Trump was seen in Osceola County, FL, outside Orlando, which has a large Puerto Rican population, a demographic that tends to vote more Democratic than other Hispanic groups.
In relatively small Imperial County, CA, home of Brawley and El Centro, Biden managed to keep the county Democratic, though Trump managed to cut off about 15 points off the margin of victory for the Democrats from 2016. Imperial is approximately 80% Hispanic.
The Black Vote
The black vote experienced less dramatic movement than the Hispanic vote, though both sides made vocal appeals to the black Americans ahead of the election. As an example, DeKalb County, GA, which is heavily African-American and part of the Atlanta metro area, moved approximately 4 points to the Democrats compared to 2016.
National exit polling had Trump doing around the same with black voters as 2016, with some showing black support for Trump slightly up. Edison's 2016 exit polling had Clinton beating Trump 88 to 8 among black voters, with 4 percent for third parties, and CNN's 2020 exit poll had Biden beating Trump 87 to 12. If these numbers are true, the overall percentage point movement is small, though for the Republicans would represent a 33.33% increase in their percentage increase of black voters.
No comments:
Post a Comment