How many of these 150 switch counties voted Democrat in 2020? Ohio (18 electoral votes) - Lean Republican. "These counties, they're not real representations of America," says Mr Kreisberg of BlueLabs Analytics. And notably, the 16 counties that lost their bellwether status in 2016 are more racially diverse (median of 46 percent non-Hispanic white, compared to 89 percent) and more highly educated (median of 27 percent of adults 25 or older with a bachelors degree or higher, compared to 22 percent) than the 19 counties that maintained their bellwether status. There are numerous theories about why it happened in 2020. From 1980 through 2016, there were19 counties that consistently voted for the eventual president. From his tweet: From 1984 through 2016, spanning presidential elections, seventeen US counties in several states ad voted for the winning presidential candidate in an astounding 148 of 153 times including 100% five times for five different presidents: Advertisement - story continues below 1984 Reagan 1996 Clinton 2000 Bush 2012 Obama 2016 Trump Colorado (9 electoral votes) - Lean Democratic. The county is home to a huge diaspora of health care workers affiliated with the Cleveland Clinic, and other players in the areas huge medical cluster. The county narrowly voted for Bush in 2000 but has gone Democratic in the three presidential elections since then, though never by more than 52 percent. While local Republican Party candidates enjoyed a bump in local media coverage for opening a new headquarters last summer, Democrats were facing vastly different circumstances. Or want to contribute to our open-source collection of articles and statistics? Texas likely isn't going Democratic, so we aren't including this in one of our 13 counties since it's less likely to decide the outcome of the presidential election. Winnebago County: A large bellwether county in east-central Wisconsin, Mr. Trump won it in 2016, but in 2018 Democrats running for governor and the Senate performed much better. Arguably, it was 2016 and not 2020 when bellwether counties first showed signs of falling by the wayside, given their dramatic swing to the right in that election. Stanislaus County, California (county seat Modesto) - one miss since 1972 (in 2016). Statewide results: 2012: Obama 50%-49% - 2008: Obama 51%-48%. (Think about what it takes, and what is required for a county to always get the election right. It has a slightly higher Hispanic population than Jefferson County 19 percent, according to the Census which makes it an uphill challenge for Donald Trump. While Bill Clinton was in town recently to open up a Democratic campaign office, party leaders are skeptical they can win here with Hillary Clinton on the ticket. GOP Chairman Dale Fellows noted that the population has been steadily aging in recent years. Watch the margins in Story (Ames) and Scott (Davenport). 1 County 61947 People 2012 Predicting since One county. Multiple factors, including higher turnout and population growth, contributed to the fact that both Biden and Trump totaledmore votes than Obama. Subscribe to breaking updates But when word got out, Trump supporters crashed it. Washoe County2016 caucus winners: Sanders, Trump2012: Obama 51%, Romney 47%, Latest voter registration totals:Republican: 105,410Democrats: 102,422Unaffiliated: 53,048Others: 19,815. Nineteen of these counties continued their streak in 2016 by voting for Trump, but the remaining 16 counties ended their bellwether streak by voting for Hillary Clinton. Even combined, they represent only53 votes a fraction of the 538 total electoral votesor the 270 electoral votes required to win the White House. Obama won it narrowly that year, by fewer than 3,000 votes. The meme compares information about former President Barack Obama in 2008 and President Donald Trump and Biden in 2020. It went Republican in 2012; if Clinton is doing better or vice-versa there compared to Obama, it could be a sign of things to come. Here's why. Here are the top 25 counties which voted over 60% for the Democrat party in 2008, and then voted Republican in 2016: There is no doubt these 25 counties heavily favor the Democrat party. Our fact check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook. The fact that there are fewer swing counties means that there are fewer potential bellwether counties. Other counties to watch: Pima (where Tucson is). By Randy Yeip and Stuart A. Thompson. Where Did All The Bellwether Counties Go? It is whiter than the rest of the state but has a slightly higher level of college degrees, although still it's just 28 percent. We believe this was a mistake. This well-educated, high-income and increasingly diverse D.C. exurb (Asians and Latinos togther make up a third of this county) went for Obama twice and roughly reflected the statewide margin. Not a bad streak. PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY EMILY SCHERER / GETTY IMAGES. The storied home of Reagan Democrats and the third most-populous county in the state, southeastern Michigans Macomb last went Republican at the presidential level in 2004. Obama won Monroe County 49.6-49.1 in 2012 and 52-47 in 2008. In this section we will introduce a new concept: The swing county. Scott Walker all three times his name appeared on the ballot. The coalition which includedthe Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the National Association of State Election Directors also noted that all states with close results had paper records of each vote. As the country's demographics shift and the rural-urban divide becomes more pronounced, the chances appear slim. The magnitude of the gap (or difference) is an indicator of the strength of the change in sentiment. The 13 Bellwether Counties That Could Decide The Election. The statistic on counties comes from a report bytheBrookings Institution on Nov. 10. If Clinton's winning there, it means she's hitting marks with young voters. Follow us on Telegram to be notified when we release the remaining articles. All other 21 counties voted Republican. Pittsburghs Allegheny County, the second-most populous county in the state after Philadelphia, is heavily Democratic. "Especially considering there's a lot of things that has been done that don't get reported at all.". It clearly shows they hold no allegiances and will vote for whichever party makes the most sense to them at each election. But in 2020, 18 of these 19 bellwether counties voted for former President Donald Trump. The divisions were everywhere. The question is just how big of a margin she can run up here -- where roughly two-thirds of the states presidential votes were cast in 2012 -- to offset Trumps victories across much of the rest of the state. (The highest value being 66.1%), When sorted from the highest to lowest Democrat percentage vote (at the 2008 election), we can see that there are 25 counties that have a percentage Democrat vote greater than 60% at the 2008 election. Statewide results: 2012: Romney 53%-46% - 2008: McCain 52%-47%. It far surpasses any statistical explanation, because at the end of the day we are dealing with real people, with real personalities, concerns and aspirations, which happen to align perfectly with the whole American population. Other counties to watch: Clark County (Las Vegas, Henderson), Democrats have to drive up big margins in Las Vegas, something they have lots of experience doing. In the western mountains on the border with Tennessee, it's home to Boone, which includes Appalachian State. A total of 35 counties voted for the winner of each presidential election from 1980 through 2012. It might be actually the best bellwether in the state, as it closely mirrored the statewide vote in both 2008 and 2012, but it has fewer voters than Jefferson, which we highlighted. (See the DPV 08 column in the image below.) None of them impacts the legitimacy of the presidential election. Re-doing the analysis we obtain 35 modern bellwether counties after the 2016 election. Demographically, the bellwether counties tended to be whiter, older, less . David Hopkins, a political scientist at Boston College, toldthe Wall Street Journal that the failure of typical bellwether counties reflects"the overall trend that we are seeing toward greater geographic polarization.". Considering how many counties there are in the USA (we h. So, even though they got it wrong in 2020, it is still worth figuring out how much they got it wrong by. While Trump won every county in the state in the GOP primary, he posted his best result in Luzerne 77 percent. Combined, they had more than twice the votes of Denver proper and 30 percent of all the votes statewide. BBC Reality Check breaks down the bill for the world's most expensive election, Arriving at a voting station to observe as a poll challenger on 4 November last, she sat down next to two people she didn't know. Will That Last?]. Democrats have a registration advantage in Iowas most populous county, and they are looking to run up Clintons numbers here as best as they can to offset expected losses in more conservative parts of the state. "They followed through the whole four years. Read about our approach to external linking. In the end, only Clallam County retained its streak this year. So we took 15 of the states where this election has been hotly waged and identified one county in each that has gone with the winner or closely reflected the statewide margin in each. Latest voter registration totals:Democrats: 369,734Republicans: 247,029No Party Affiliation: 218,642Others: 30,414. It won't be enough for Trump; he also needs to likely win by more than Romney did in Brown (Green Bay) and drive up turn out in Waukesha, one of the reddest and most populous counties in the state. i.e. In 2008, Obama received69,498,516 votes, per the Federal Election Commission. . A few counties in America are known as the "bellwether counties": Those locations that always end up voting for the candidate who ultimately wins in the presidential election. And this is the state with the highest share of whites with college degrees in the country. Do you know this baby? Obama won it with 53 percent of the vote while winning statewide by just 75,000 votes in 2012. It gets a lot more interesting. It's something Joan Day-Baker, chair of Valencia County's Democratic Party, has witnessed first-hand. Salt Lake City elected its first lesbian mayor this year, and Obama actually won Salt Lake County by a few hundred votes in 2008. Now imagine getting 21 out of 22! Mike Pence, could marshal his supporters to cross the border and provide support. That's 14 in a row. (subject to censorship). During the campaign Mrs Day-Baker says that local Democrats organised a "Ridin' for Biden" parade of vehicles through parts of the county. You should now have a real tangible sense of how difficult it is to get a streak of 10. Or, if you dont have enough time, how many of the top 10 switch counties, which overwhelmingly voted Democrat in 2008 (with a percentage Democrat vote over 58% ! 9. Clinton is counting on running up big numbers in the city of Pittsburgh to offset any gains Trump may make in the suburbs, and in the more conservative surrounding southwestern Pennsylvania counties, including Westmoreland County. So those suburban whites are key here and might tell a story not just about who wins the state, but who wins nationally. It also backed Gov. Due to health and time constraints of our original contributors and a lack of volunteers to replace them, we haven't been able to keep pace with the further reports and findings after May 2022, including the Nov 2022 Mid-Term Elections, during which, sadly, many of the same irregularities and potential fraud occurred. "It wasn't part of his strategy.". The following 111 counties have deviated from the winner of the presidential election in two elections since 1980: Allamakee County, Iowa, in 1992 and 2020 [3] Alamosa County, Colorado, in 2016 and 2020 [3] Baldwin County, Georgia, in 1980 and 2016 [3] Benzie County, Michigan, in 2012 and 2020 [3] Blue Earth County, Minnesota, in 1988 and 2004 [3] Marcela Stewart speaks to a voter at an event to encourage minority voter turnout n Cutler Bay, Fla., on Sunday. To make things more interesting we will only look at swing counties since the 2004 election. For a county to be considered a bellwether it would have to vote for the winning party at each of the following elections: That is 4 switches in 8 election cycles! It did go for John Kerry in 2004, though, when Bush won the state, so let's see if Monroe retains its bellwether status beyond two elections or if it was just a cheeseburger in paradise. Below are 10 bellwether counties that could give signs as to how the electorate feels this cycle and in future races. Once you have found all the results and looked at the trends, remember, these counties are the best counties at predicting an election outcome! Enter Donald Trump. Pennsylvania (20 electoral votes) - Lean Democratic. Statewide results: 2012: Obama 52%-46% - 2008: Obama 55%-43%. And as was true in 2016, those counties voted substantially to the right of the nation. @ryanmatsumoto1, Donald Trump (1624 posts) In an election that will be decided by a relatively small group of pivotal counties within a relatively small set of swing states, POLITICO has selected 25 critical battleground counties that are poised to be difference makers, places that could have a material impact on the presidential election. 12. Other counties to watch: Also watch Luzerne (Wilkes-Barre). Traditional Republican eastern counties of Carroll, Belknap and Rockingham, home to Portsmouth, fell back to the GOP in 2012, but not by enough for Romney, who had a home in the state, to win. That'sanother reason results of the contests might not have lined up. Neither Clinton nor Trump won here during the caucuses in this Mississippi River county. A bellwether county that includes Canton, its part of a heavily blue collar region where Trumps message could resonate. Learn how and when to remove this template message, "How many counties are in the United States? Instead, you can Find the latest updates on our Telegram channel which has more recent updates. Increased political polarization is another reason why fewer counties are consistently indicative of presidential results in recent years. Have you looked at the results of these counties? Go on, look them up! Moving forward, it is entirely possible that there will be no single county that consistently indicates the results of a national election. Out of 3,141 counties, there were 22 counties that had successfully voted for the winning candidate in each and every election between 1988 and 2016 (included). And like so many electoral trends, demographics play a major role in explaining why these once-bellwether counties finally missed the mark in 2020. (You can make up your own mind on what the trends mean.). The website FiveThirtyEight pointed out in 2021 that, in the 2016 election Trump won, opponent Hillary Clinton carried 16 of the 35 counties that had gone for the winner in every election from. But its not just demographic trends driving the loss of bellwether status. Statewide results: 2012: Romney 57%-41% - 2008: McCain 55%-44%. With a total turnout of 78%, Donald Trump won Ottawa County by a margin of 61% to 38%, improving his 2016 return by four points. University of New Hampshire . If it's close here, Georgia could be in play. Clinton needs to be closer to Obama's 57 percent in 2008 than his 55 percent in 2012. Published Nov. 8, 2016 at 5:30 a.m. In each of the past three presidential elections, Arizona has had four consistently Democratic counties (Apache, Coconino, Pima, Santa Cruz) and 11 Republican ones (Cochise, Gila, Graham, Greenlee, La Paz, Maricopa, Mohave, Navajo, Pinal, Yavapai and Yuma). Tampa's Hillsborough County is a top bellwether -- since 1960, no candidate has won Florida . Free and open-source. This county, home to Reno, borders California and is at the opposite end of the state from Las Vegas. Wood County is a decent bellwether of the state: Mr. Trump carried it by eight points in 2016, matching his statewide margin. ), voted Democrat again in 2020? In politics, the term often applies in a metaphorical sense to characterize a geographic region where political tendencies match in microcosm those of a wider area, such that the result of an election in the former region might predict the eventual result in the latter. They simply vote on merit. (The highest value being 60.6%), When sorted from the highest to lowest Democrat percentage vote (at the 2008 election), we can see that there are 4 counties that have a percentage Democrat vote greater than 60% at the 2008 election. Trump also needs to overperform in Macomb, another Detroit suburb, which narrowly went for Obama in 2012. 'Forest defenders' begin week of action to block Atlanta police training center, Frogxit: Harry and Meghan get what they asked for, More Iranian schoolgirls fall ill, protests erupt, Russell Brand was challenged to give examples of MSNBC pushing misinformation (that was a BAD idea), Secretary of the Army Guarantees a Lot of Young Soldiers Will Die but Has the Right Thoughts and Feelings, California - Do Not Sell My Personal Information. How Does The Electoral College Work And Is It Fair? What does this mean for the nation's political-economic divide? It voted twice for Bush and twice for Obama. A majority of voters here had backed the eventual winner of presidential elections every time since 1964. It went for Romney 54 to 44 percent, nearly reflecting the overall margin. Feel free to forward a link to your elected officials as well. Here are the concepts we have established so far: This is just the beginning. Statewide results: 2012: Romney 51%-49% - 2008: Obama 50%-49%. Of these 35 counties, 10 of them consistently voted over 50% for the winning candidate since the year 2000. "End of day, the solution is complicated but the problem is very simple," wrote a user who shared the meme on Instagram. Keep in mind that if we started the attrition from the 1980 election, there would still be 19 counties standing after the 2016 election. Fourth, it lists whether they won Florida, Ohio and Iowa Obama won them, Trump won them, Biden lost them. The best bellwether counties will consistently vote more than 50% for the winning party. Wisconsin (10 electoral votes) - Lean Democratic. In Westmoreland County, Virginia - a small, rural community south of Washington DC that's failed to be a bellwether only twice since 1928, and is home to twice the number of African Americans than the national average - he beat Mr Biden by 16 points. November 8, 2016 9:29 AM ET. A caveat: because its black population is higher than the state average (21 percent versus 13 percent), the county has gone narrowly for Democrats even in 2004 and 2000 when George W. Bush won the state. Third, it lists the fractionof bellwether counties each candidate won Obama at 18 of 19, Trump at 18 of 19 and Biden at one of 19. Only one of them, Washington state's Clallam County, backed. Almost a quarter of Obama's votes in 2012 came out of Wayne County (Detroit), which is 41 percent black. Latest voter registration totals:Democrats: 105,724Republicans: 70,060Unaffiliated: 15,141Other: 6,079. But since it's gotten so much attention this cycle with the possibility that independent Evan McMullin siphons off votes from Trump, we kept it in here. It very closely mirrors the rest of the state demographically (with a slightly higher Asian population), but it is far more educated. So, for our purposes, a swing county would have voted as follows: There are 80 such counties. This populous, longtime Republican county has shifted in the last two presidential elections, as demograpic change has swept the metro Atlanta area. But its population has steadily diversified, including a surge in Asian and Latino voters, which has made it more competitive Obama carried it twice. All Rights Reserved. Here are the top 30 sorted by the highest to lowest Democrat percentage vote in 2008, thats the DPV 08 column: Find out at politico.com/2020-election/results. But that changed in 2016 when Trump made huge gains with white voters without a college degree. "There are more and more places in this country that are consistently red or blue, so there are fewer and fewer counties that swing back and forth from election to election," he said. In other words, we are including more counties that are more likely to vote for the Democrat party. Some of the same messages that are going to work in Northeastern Ohio are maybe not going to work as well down here, said county GOP Chairman Alex Triantafilou. Valencia County is home to a string of towns along the banks of the Rio Grande river in an otherwise largely arid stretch of desert south of Albuquerque. Of these 35 counties, 10 of them consistently voted over 50% for the winning candidate since the year 2000. 8. Suburban Richmonds Henrico County was once a reliable GOP stronghold it went twice for George W. Bush and backed Bob McDonnell in his 2009 gubernatorial win. Seven counties, including Vigo, have got it right in the past dozen elections.
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