2020 Presidential Election Results by Top 50 MSA

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by memph

Trump also made major gains in Hispanic majority areas, most notably South Florida, the Rio Grande Valley and the Bronx. He also made surprising gains in Queens, Philadelphia, Santa Cruz County AZ (Nogales) and Imperial County CA. For example, Trump gained more votes in Philadelphia than any other county in Pennsylvania.

But just like we have to ask whether those that voted Biden-Harris will be as negatively energized against Trumpism in future elections, we also have to ask whether Trump's 2020 voters will be as energized in future elections now that Trump has been further disgraced by the Capitol Riots (and may not be able to run in 2024?).

Trump did a little better in places like Philadelphia and the Bronx than he did 4 years ago, but he did so poorly in 2016 that there was nowhere to go but up. Biden also got more votes than Hillary in both of those places.

Using the Bronx as an example, Trump almost doubled his vote total from 2016, but still only got 15% of the vote. He apparently just consolidated the third party vote. In fact, Trump performed almost exactly the same in the Bronx in 2020 as Bush did in his 2004 re-election campaign, which is the last time an incumbent Republican president was on the ballot. That alone makes me extremely skeptical of a meaningful realignment of the minority vote in the GOP's favor.

The only places where the Hispanic vote worked in his favor was south Florida and south Texas.

[Crawford]

The Hispanic support for Trumpism is strongman populism, rather than support for GOP policies.

Mexico's President is very Trumpy and popular (he's left wing but close with Trump and speaks the same language), and Cuban and Venezuelan immigrants in the U.S. tend to be supporters of the deposed right wing regimes.

Won't work when you trot out Josh Hawley, unless he starts grabbing 'em in the p---y, starts talking about giving reporters a beatdown, and the like. If it's the old GOP deficits and corporate tax cut wonkery, you've lost that vote.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

The Hispanic support for Trumpism is strongman populism, rather than support for GOP policies.

Mexico's President is very Trumpy and popular (he's left wing but close with Trump and speaks the same language), and Cuban and Venezuelan immigrants in the U.S. tend to be supporters of the deposed right wing regimes.

Won't work when you trot out Josh Hawley, unless he starts grabbing 'em in the p---y, starts talking about giving reporters a beatdown, and the like. If it's the old GOP deficits and corporate tax cut wonkery, you've lost that vote.

Maybe. But what happened in 2020 could have also been incumbent privilege. That's why it's important to look at how Trump performed against Bush. I just went back and checked Miami-Dade County in 2020 against 2004. It was exactly the same as the Bronx. Trump's performance in Miami-Dade was exactly the same as Bush's in 2004.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Maybe. But what happened in 2020 could have also been incumbent privilege. That's why it's important to look at how Trump performed against Bush. I just went back and checked Miami-Dade County in 2020 against 2004. It was exactly the same as the Bronx. Trump's performance in Miami-Dade was exactly the same as Bush's in 2004.

Right, but look at the demographic differences over time. The coastal areas (wealthier, more educated) are now deep blue. The working-middle class Hispanic areas are red or red-leaning, when, in order to win FL, the Dems have to absolutely clean up in places like Hialeah.

Miami Dade in 2004 was less Hispanic, and the GOP won the wealthier, whiter areas.

Bronx is very Hispanic, like Miami-Dade, but the demographics aren't that similar. Heavily Dominican and Puerto Rican, overwhelmingly renters, hardcore urban. There's definitely some strongman appeal with Caribbean Hispanics, especially males, across the two counties, but the nuances are different.

[M II A II R II K]

This Is Why Texas Is the Next Georgia

https://www.thenation.com/article/po...ons-democrats/

.....

- Barack Obama’s historic 2008 victory was the fact that he got 47 percent of the vote in Georgia although he had removed staff from the state and stopped advertising there. Obama lost the Peach State by 205,000 votes, and there were nearly 1 million people of color who were eligible to vote but didn’t cast ballots. You didn’t have to be great at math to see that increasing the number of voters of color was the path to making major change in Georgia.

- The Lone Star State has the second-largest pool of nonvoting people of color of any state in the country (second only to already-blue California), and the number of potential voters of color far exceeds the margin of difference in statewide elections. Joe Biden lost Texas by 631,221 votes, and despite the record turnout on both sides, 4.5 million eligible people of color still did not vote, according to exit polls and Census data.

- The Texas Organizing Project has a membership of 285,000 people, and in 2020 reported that it directly turned out 310,000 infrequent voters of color who did not vote in 2016. TOP’s voter registration and mobilization work has tipped the balance in close mayoral elections in Houston and San Antonio, and it has helped elect progressive district attorneys in five counties. The fact that Trump won Texas obscures the progress that has been made.

- Trump squeezed every last vote out of a constituency going through what Joy Reid calls “demographic panic,” and, as the Georgia runoff elections showed, without Trump and the fanatical allegiance to him that leads people to storm the Capitol and murder police officers, Republican turnout is less visceral and large, making winning the Texas gubernatorial election and capturing the state House in 2022 a real possibility.

.....

[Crawford]

Right, Trump supporters aren't normal voters, and can't be compared to past GOP voters. They're fanatical. Fanatical support isn't fungible. You can't run Donnie Jr. or Josh Hawley and expect the same deep devotion. Would they storm the capital for Ted Cruz?

The policies are irrelevant, it's the personality. Past GOP voters were policy voters.

[TexasPlaya]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

This Is Why Texas Is the Next Georgia

https://www.thenation.com/article/po...ons-democrats/

We need our own Stacey Abrams.

[DCReid]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Right, but look at the demographic differences over time. The coastal areas (wealthier, more educated) are now deep blue. The working-middle class Hispanic areas are red or red-leaning, when, in order to win FL, the Dems have to absolutely clean up in places like Hialeah.

Miami Dade in 2004 was less Hispanic, and the GOP won the wealthier, whiter areas.

Bronx is very Hispanic, like Miami-Dade, but the demographics aren't that similar. Heavily Dominican and Puerto Rican, overwhelmingly renters, hardcore urban. There's definitely some strongman appeal with Caribbean Hispanics, especially males, across the two counties, but the nuances are different.

Harping that Democrats are left-wing socialists did benefit Republicans in those districts, as it conjured up thoughts of Cuba and Venezuela, and possibly even some difficulties of some of the countries they came from. It's most telling that much of the same Florida electorate that keyed Trump's victory in that state also voted to raise the minimum wage in Florida to $15.

[memph]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

metro houston isn't the best place to go looking for the suburban blue shift. though slowly trending blue over the long term, it remains one of the most stubbornly purple MSAs over 3M people in the nation (along with dallas and phoenix).

for a counter-example, look at what happened in atlanta's burbs, and how the significant blue shift there was able to flip the entire state. If the GOP decides to stay on board trump's crazy train, instead of coming back to some semblance of sanity, they likely loose GA again in 2024.

Well, I brought up Houston because SamInTheLoop brought it up as an example of a large metropolitan area whose the fast growing suburbs were shifting D (and also because many Democrats are hoping to swing Texas in the future, like in that article M II A II R II K just posted.

There's definitely other big cities where that is happening in the suburbs though, Philadelphia being one notable example.

I guess it depends how exactly the GOP play it. If people turn out to vote Democrat in the same numbers in future elections as they did in 2020, then yeah, the GOP are screwed, because they aren't going to be able to match the turnout Trump got in 2020 let alone exceed it.

But I still think the effect of Trump energizing people against him will be lower without him at the helm, ie both turnout for the Democrat and Republican candidate will be lower in future elections. I mean the Biden-Harris ticket was in large part running on the platform of "Trump is the worst, vote him out". Where does that leave them with Trump out of the picture?

[SamInTheLoop]

^ It's true that Houston had by far the smallest R to D shift (just ~1 pct pt) from '16 - 20 of those 4 metro areas. Dallas (~8 pct pts) actually had the largest, followed by Atlanta (~7 pct pts) and Phoenix (~5 pct pts). But certainly all are (beyond the shorter term Trumpism cult phenomenon) undergoing a longer-term shift from R to D (granted, at varying rates), as their suburbs grow and become more diverse (and very importantly the shift in party affiliation/voting preferences among population with higher educational attainment).

However, there's a huge miss in your analysis. You seem to be placing a higher emphasis on the impact of Trumpism on D voter turnout than on R voter turnout. That is a ludicrous misread of the politics. Trumpism turbocharged low-propensity white non-college voter turnout - much more so than D low-propensity voter turnout (although anti-Trump sentiment among Ds was certainly palpable). How many of these white non-college voters is the Republican party terrified will never (or at least rarely or only occasionally) vote for them again with Trump chased from office? 10 million? 15 million? More? It's a white resentment personality cult, and as others have alluded to, personality cults don't transfer well - congressional (and definitely state and local Rs) know this and are petrified of the implications. It explains so much of what we are witnessing - A party that didn't bother to put together an actual platform! Fear/refusal to hold Trump accountable for his dereliction of his oath of office!, continuing to seek out his approval, permission, endorsement!, etc. It's long past the time to continue to maintain the pretense that modern Republicans are a normal American political party - it's just not. It's Trumpism - that's the party, and the party is what it's base is - white, poorly educated, grievance holders (this is the polite way to describe it). Don't get me wrong - there is still obviously an elite component - the money people and the idealogues that still are there to use that base to advance their own interests in the form of libertarian economic policy, tax cuts, debt fear mongering, the courts - they are what they've always been, and they're just opportunists now of course. But the reason congressional Republicans are acting so batshit right now is they have much more to lose than democrats from losing the Trump-motivated vote.

One other particularly egregious representation made:

"I mean the Biden-Harris ticket was in large part running on the platform of 'Trump is the worst, vote him out'."

That is absolutely ahistoric. Nothing but silly 'anti-anti-Trumper' flotsam - the kind of nonsense encapsulated by those deriding as "Orange man bad" the position of defenders of democracy, the rule of law, American institutions, truth, science, the Constitution - you know, quaint notions such as those. Biden had a policy platform, and they promoted it. At the same time, of course they are going to vigorously denounce the countless horrors of the Administration and man he was running against. It's to Ds advantage to actually run on policies and ideas (and ideals), because they have a diverse coalition as a base - you need to unify these different groups by selling policies that people will think will improve their lives, and those of their families and communities. It's different for the modern day GOP as their base is not diverse. This was a decision that they consciously made, by the way - following the '12 autopsy, they ignored their own recommendations to make major platform changes and reach out to various groups....instead they ultimately decided to go all in on white nationalism and the propaganda/disinformation ecosphere required to fully stoke it - I'll never forget at the '12 Convention, Lindsay Graham said (correctly), "We're not generating enough angry white guys to stay in business for the long term." Here's the crazy part - instead of doing the hard but necessary work of reforming the party so that it's not at its core dependent on angry white guys, they instead decided to focus their efforts on absolutely maximizing the angry white guy vote!!! It was the strategy they went with. I don't know, on reflection perhaps I give them too much credit historically to call that surprising.

Remember, it was the GOP that literally threw out any pretense that it was running on a platform - for the cult leader at its helm.

[Crawford]

Right, it's true that Trumpism fueled turnout among "both sides", but the motivated turnout was quite different.

Pro-Trump turnout were heavily rural, uneducated, white low propensity voters. Anti-Trump turnout were heavily suburban, educated white high propensity voters. Post-Trump the odds of Dems retaining the latter are much higher than the odds of the GOP retaining the former.

[DCReid]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

This Is Why Texas Is the Next Georgia

https://www.thenation.com/article/po...ons-democrats/

Well good luck with that! Those Republican controlled states are going to busy enacting new laws to keep people from voting more easily, such as by absentee, or at all. I just read Georgia wants to require those voting by absentee to send in copies of their IDs multiple times. Those states and many of the voters to the right equate making voting easy and convenient with rampant fraud...And I would be shocked if the Supreme Court stopped them given its composition.

[KB0679]

Originally Posted by DCReid

Well good luck with that! Those Republican controlled states are going to busy enacting new laws to keep people from voting more easily, such as by absentee, or at all. I just read Georgia wants to require those voting by absentee to send in copies of their IDs multiple times. Those states and many of the voters to the right equate making voting easy and convenient with rampant fraud...And I would be shocked if the Supreme Court stopped them given its composition.

All the more reason to jettison the filibuster so Congress can pass comprehensive election reform and voting rights bills.

[memph]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Right, it's true that Trumpism fueled turnout among "both sides", but the motivated turnout was quite different.

Pro-Trump turnout were heavily rural, uneducated, white low propensity voters. Anti-Trump turnout were heavily suburban, educated white high propensity voters. Post-Trump the odds of Dems retaining the latter are much higher than the odds of the GOP retaining the former.

If I had to bet, I'd say the GOP will lose more voters than the Democrats in future elections, but I don't think it's a sure thing. I agree with your characterization of the anti-Trump turn out, but some of those might have been Independents and former Republican voters that would consider voting for a less extreme version of Trump, no?

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by memph

I agree with your characterization of the anti-Trump turn out, but some of those might have been Independents and former Republican voters that would consider voting for a less extreme version of Trump, no?

I agree that a traditional GOP candidate would be likely to win back those voters. But I think any Trumpian candidate, even a Trump lite, would have a similarly rough time in educated suburbia. Suburban soccer moms, generally speaking, detest Trumpism.

Another factor going forward is the evangelical vote. They vote more than anyone. Share of evangelicals dropped from 23% to 18% over four years, but share of evangelical voters stayed constant at 25%. They turned out for Trump, bigtime.

[dimondpark]

Originally Posted by Crawford

The Hispanic support for Trumpism is strongman populism, rather than support for GOP policies.

Mexico's President is very Trumpy and popular (he's left wing but close with Trump and speaks the same language), and Cuban and Venezuelan immigrants in the U.S. tend to be supporters of the deposed right wing regimes.

Won't work when you trot out Josh Hawley, unless he starts grabbing 'em in the p---y, starts talking about giving reporters a beatdown, and the like. If it's the old GOP deficits and corporate tax cut wonkery, you've lost that vote.

I am so annoyed by this^ because it's true.

[Comrade]

Between 2012 and 2016, the GOP traded the suburbs for rural voters, especially in Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. It worked in 2016 and almost worked again in 2020 (did work in Ohio). Previous Republican candidates lost these states (except for Bush in Ohio) because they failed to drive up voter turnout in the rural parts to match the Democratic turnout in the cities and a mix of more suburban successes.

If you're the Republican Party, those four states still remain the most logical roadmap to the presidency. It's not 2004 anymore. Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico are either solidly blue (New Mexico, Colorado trending) or slight blue (Nevada). In 2004, Kerry, against the Old GOP, managed to win Wisconsin (barely), Michigan (fairly comfortably) and Pennsylvania (similarly). Had he just won Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico, three states he lost by a combined 127,000 votes, he wins the presidency.

But Trump's success in those four states he won in 2016, and nearly won again in 2020 (minus, again, Ohio, which he did win), was solely built out of his support driving out uneducated, white voters, specifically in the rural areas. What drew them to him? I think it was entirely rhetoric. That voting demographic seemed to be fueled by division politics - an us against the world type of mentality. This has largely been a resentful group who, though not popular at the time, Obama nailed when he said they cling to their guns and religion. It is cult-like in the sense that the whole narrative is to blame everyone else for your lot in life.

Prior to Trump, the GOP skirted that blame. They might have done it subtly by blaming Mexicans for taking the jobs, but it wasn't outright brazen like with Trump and in many ways, that pacified rhetoric subdued turnout. Along comes Trump, though, and intensifies it. Your economic woes are a direct result of free trade (despite the fact the job situation in these communities didn't get significantly better in Trump's four years). Your lot in life is not your fault, it's this person's fault and you better vote for me so we can hold them accountable.

It was the same way with how he spoke of the COVID pandemic. Everything was China's fault. Nothing was his fault. Blame China.

And that resonated with voters. I hate saying it, because I am sure there will be some that disagree, but there is a group of Americans who are perpetually angry. They've been angry for years. They're angry at their financial situation. They're angry that they're losing influence locally and nationally. They're angry that a black person may be having more success than they are because it's not natural. They're angry at life and while the GOP has been a natural progression for these folks, no one quite gave them the platform Trump did.

But this is the problem the GOP finds itself in with guys like Cruz and Rubio and even Hailey. They're not as audacious as Trump with that level of rhetoric. But it's so thoroughly tainted the party that the only way they're ever going to win back moderate suburban voters is likely with a candidate who outright repudiates Trump and that's not going to happen anytime soon because they aren't likely to win the nomination to get to the general where it might be more effective. But because they don't have the shamelessness of Trump, at least to that level, they're probably not going to draw from the rural voters at near the level he did. Those rural voters won't vote Democratic. They just won't vote.

There's one other factor here, though: 2016 likely would have been won by Hillary had the third parties not done as well as they did in WI, PA and MI. So, really, Trumpism as an ideology leads to such a narrow path to victory that it's not likely to result in many successes going forward.

[JManc]

Originally Posted by TexasPlaya

We need our own Stacey Abrams.

And Beto isn't it.

[Manitopiaaa]

Originally Posted by Comrade

Between 2012 and 2016, the GOP traded the suburbs for rural voters, especially in Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. It worked in 2016 and almost worked again in 2020 (did work in Ohio). Previous Republican candidates lost these states (except for Bush in Ohio) because they failed to drive up voter turnout in the rural parts to match the Democratic turnout in the cities and a mix of more suburban successes.

If you're the Republican Party, those four states still remain the most logical roadmap to the presidency. It's not 2004 anymore. Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico are either solidly blue (New Mexico, Colorado trending) or slight blue (Nevada). In 2004, Kerry, against the Old GOP, managed to win Wisconsin (barely), Michigan (fairly comfortably) and Pennsylvania (similarly). Had he just won Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico, three states he lost by a combined 127,000 votes, he wins the presidency.

But Trump's success in those four states he won in 2016, and nearly won again in 2020 (minus, again, Ohio, which he did win), was solely built out of his support driving out uneducated, white voters, specifically in the rural areas. What drew them to him? I think it was entirely rhetoric. That voting demographic seemed to be fueled by division politics - an us against the world type of mentality. This has largely been a resentful group who, though not popular at the time, Obama nailed when he said they cling to their guns and religion. It is cult-like in the sense that the whole narrative is to blame everyone else for your lot in life.

Prior to Trump, the GOP skirted that blame. They might have done it subtly by blaming Mexicans for taking the jobs, but it wasn't outright brazen like with Trump and in many ways, that pacified rhetoric subdued turnout. Along comes Trump, though, and intensifies it. Your economic woes are a direct result of free trade (despite the fact the job situation in these communities didn't get significantly better in Trump's four years). Your lot in life is not your fault, it's this person's fault and you better vote for me so we can hold them accountable.

It was the same way with how he spoke of the COVID pandemic. Everything was China's fault. Nothing was his fault. Blame China.

And that resonated with voters. I hate saying it, because I am sure there will be some that disagree, but there is a group of Americans who are perpetually angry. They've been angry for years. They're angry at their financial situation. They're angry that they're losing influence locally and nationally. They're angry that a black person may be having more success than they are because it's not natural. They're angry at life and while the GOP has been a natural progression for these folks, no one quite gave them the platform Trump did.

But this is the problem the GOP finds itself in with guys like Cruz and Rubio and even Hailey. They're not as audacious as Trump with that level of rhetoric. But it's so thoroughly tainted the party that the only way they're ever going to win back moderate suburban voters is likely with a candidate who outright repudiates Trump and that's not going to happen anytime soon because they aren't likely to win the nomination to get to the general where it might be more effective. But because they don't have the shamelessness of Trump, at least to that level, they're probably not going to draw from the rural voters at near the level he did. Those rural voters won't vote Democratic. They just won't vote.

There's one other factor here, though: 2016 likely would have been won by Hillary had the third parties not done as well as they did in WI, PA and MI. So, really, Trumpism as an ideology leads to such a narrow path to victory that it's not likely to result in many successes going forward.

The problem for the GOP continues to be the impending Texas calamity:

2000: +21.32% R
2004: +22.87% R
2008: +11.77% R
2012: +15.79% R
2016: +8.98% R
2020: +5.65% R

Those trendlines suggest that the GOP margin in Texas declines by 0.8% per year or 3.2% per 4-year cycle.

So we would expect on average something like this:
2024: +2.45% R
2028: +0.75% D [FLIP]
2032: +3.95% D
2036: +7.15% D

etc.

So if we look at 2028, adjust for the 2020 Census counts, and assume the Democrats hold every state that they won in 2020 by 10% or more, then we have the following:

208 Electoral Votes: D states by +10% in 2020

At that point, Dems are 62 EVs away from the White House

1. Give them Minnesota (+7.1% Biden) and Democrats are at 217.
2. Give them Georgia (rapidly trending left) and they're at 233.
3. Give them Texas (rapidly trending left) and the Dems are at 274.

At that point, the GOP could win Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Maine at large, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin (essentially all swing states save Georgia and Texas) and still lose.

Basically, whatever their coalition becomes, it has to be geared toward Texas. Losing Texas collapses the house of cards.

And the biggest wild card is Latinos. Trump won Texas by 5.65% with record margins among Latinos. If they hadn't trended GOP, Biden would have lost by ~2%, suggesting the GOP needs to make sure there's no retrenchment in the Rio Grande Valley or the 2028 number above could happen even sooner.

The second wild card is the decline of the rural White population and the Boomer population. By 2030, the oldest boomers will be in their mid-80s. In other words, in rapid decline due to death. So the trend could actually speed itself up.

[Ant131531]

It's going to be weird and awkward when the GOP actually has to begin pandering/catering to a growing Latino voting coalition. That's their path forward. Convince conservative Latinos/Hispanics who vote Dem to vote for them instead because of conservative ideals and traditions.

The white share of the population is dropping and soon, you won't be able to win on white voters alone. Sub-50% non-hispanic white in 20 years or so(it's slowdown a bit under Trump because immigration has slowed down).

I don't think it's an impossible task for the GOP, but it's going to require some introspection. Also, I think black males(especially uneducated, lower income) are a potential demographic the GOP can target in 10 years or so. Trump made an attempt and cut down their support for Biden quite a bit, but that could just be "strongman" Trump rather than anything else.