Which of the big 3 cities is the most conservative: NYC, LA or Chicago?
 

Probably not L.A., even though it would have been the most Republican/conservative by far back in the days when it was dominated by white Protestant Midwesterners.

Chicago is probably the most Democratic of the three, but it's largely machine Democrat rather than liberal Democrat.

NYC has its "liberal elite" swath of Manhattan and gentrified Brooklyn and the city is stereotypically ultra-liberal (Ted Cruz lashed out against "New York values" in the GOP primary; Newt Gingrich in the 1990s called New York an enclave of out of touch liberal/elitist values). But it probably has bigger swaths of political conservatism than Chicago does.

My first thought was Chicago(land). It's an urban bubble surrounded by rural counties and states for hundreds of miles in each direction.

But then you have LA, which has the IE and OC that are definitely more conservative than Central LA.

NY is so massive that it contains large populations of everything, so maybe NY...
:shrug:

It's either between NY and Chicago if I were to speculate. I'd say Chicago. No way for LA given the ethnic makeup.

As a % or ratio per 100,000, my money's on Chicago.

I think if we factor in the metro area, Chicago would be #1 in regards to the OP question. Even basing it on election data per county. Not to say that the NY metro doesn't have its conservative pockets, because it does. Actually, if anything, this election was an eye opener.

Yeah but which election? I would think that local elections would be a better indicator than presidential elections. Maybe state representatives? Mayors? City council members?

Presidential based on the turnout for a guestimate on the OP's question. I think if we were to look at mid terms, it might change the ranking per say.

But local as well, although I'd imagine the presidential would see higher turnout. Local can vary as it's not so much ego based. Take NJ, we elected Christie, in a democratic fortress.

Have you seen the voting map for New York vs Chicago?

NYC is more conservative without a doubt.

Are you talking city or metro?

Also, how are you defining conservative?

NYC probably had proportionally more Trump voters, because the Hasidic community generally voted for Trump. LA and Chicago don't really have Hasidic voting blocks.

Not sure this is a proxy for "conservatism"; though, it's just that you have a sizable demographic that votes according to its elders (and they have voted for everything from far Left to far Right candidates). The same Hasidic leaders had their community vote for far Left candidates like DeBlasio, and have generally endorsed Dem candidates for President, including B. Clinton and Carter. But they were mad at Obama re. Israel so went for Trump.

And Trump isn't a Republican or traditional Conservative. I'm not sure this past election is really a good proxy for relative political conservatism.

If local elections, NYC is almost certainly most liberal, Chicago most conservative. NYC is the only place in the U.S. where most housing is non-market, where unions dominate, pre-1990's welfare still exists, where stuff like free pre-K, free college, free public hospitals, etc. are pretty much a local consensus.

If Presidential elections, and going by party only, the reverse could be argued. NYC has the massive Hasidic populations that can go Republican, plus Soviet emigrees vote reflexively Republican, regardless of candidate, and Italian enclaves in the Northeast liked Trump (though don't usually trend so Republican).

Chicago doesn't have these demographics, and is pretty much a solid Dem town, though Dem doesn't mean liberal/progressive, of course (Rahm is almost certainly far to the right of Bloomberg, to say nothing of DeBlasio). I'm not sure a solid Dem white ethnic cop neighborhood in Chicago is more liberal than a Republican leaning equivalent in NYC; it's just a reflection of demographics and local voting cleavages.

And NYC "cop neighborhoods" generally aren't in NYC; as there are no city residency requirements. Employees like teachers, firefighters, etc. are scattered about the region, so you don't have city worker constituency neighborhoods, to the same extent.

If it is by metro area than Chicagoland for sure.

2/3'rds of the people in the Chicagoland area live outside the city borders.

Illinois has a GOP governor. The two other states no way.

For Illinois to get a Republican governor the normal purple collar counties, and suburban Cook Co. have to vote more Red to overcome the City. That's where most of the votes are in the state, in the Burbs.

But as we see in a general federal election Illinois while blue it is not nearly the dark deep blue wall that is California and New York State.

There are definitely Hasidic voting blocks in Chicago.

This is between cities, not states.

Rauner won because Democrats have literally bankrupted the state. Trump had WAY more support in NYC than Chicago.

On a broader spectrum the 3 cities are more similar than different when it comes the top policies that are determinative of liberal v. conservative, I suppose. I however cannot imagine someone like Rudy Giuliani could ever be mayor of Los Angeles.

Oh, he definitely could have been mayor. LA had Richard Riordan, who was at least as conservative as Giuliani.

Keep in mind that 1994-era Giuliani has nothing to do with 2017-era Giuliani. As mayor he declared NYC a sanctuary city for undocumented immigrants, endorsed ultra-liberal Mario Cuomo for governor, campaigned for gay rights (even went in drag at an event), expanded rent control, supported universal health care, was almost militant pro-choice (including huge expansion of public funding for abortions, and supported late-term abortions), was against the death penalty and ran on the Liberal ticket as well as the Republican ticket.

He was a lifelong liberal (was big Kennedy/McGovern/Carter supporter), then went nominally Republican, then completely lost his mind. Now he's basically to the right of Atilla the Hun. It's been an utterly bizarre transformation.

Where are these alleged Hasidic voting blocks in Chicago? I don't think there's even a majority Jewish neighborhood in Chicago these days. West Rogers Park comes the closest but certainly isn't mostly Hasidic.

There are barely any substantial Hasidic populations anywhere on the planet outside of Israel and a few pockets in the NYC metro. Even in NYC they really only have a notable impact in Brooklyn.

im guessing the new york metro would be the most conservative. im glad you make the distinction between labor democrat and social democrat. that was hillary's biggest misstep in the great lakes and probably cost her the election. LA's large mexican and immigrant population might make it lean a bit more conservative on reproductive rights and family issues though.

Great point. Does anybody have a voting map from 2008 or 2012?

This seems like an awfully hair-splitty exercise. These three cities that are all decidedly blue in the American political context.

The Italian vote in the New York area seems more Republican than elsewhere (though Italian Americans everywhere swung towards Trump). They seem to be more practical law-and-order type conservatives though, rather than free market ideologues or hardcore social conservatives.

Maybe they're more conservative in New York because they're less assimilated?

Anothe reason for their conservative may be just related to their economic position (i.e. more affluent than their educational attainments suggest).

I want to say Chicago, but honestly it's probably really close. All 3 are on the more liberal spectrum of things.

Montreal is the only other city I can think of in North America like this. Maybe Philly? :shrug:

Of the big three cities in Canada, Toronto, although a generally progressive city, is the most conservative.

If we are talking metro areas, LA is the least conservative. ethnic whites are pretty darn conservative (Italians, Irish, east Europeans) and they are heavily represented in NY and Chicago.

They're all very liberal cities, this is like asking which latte is the least liquidy.

Sure, but it makes for more interesting discussion than which is more conservative: Seattle or Tulsa?

Don't know about overall, but when it comes to development policy it's not even a discussion.

EDIT: nevermind, I didn't realize this was about the actual populace.

Agree and surprisingly a lot of that conservatism is due to immigration. Western liberal views like gender equality, LGBTQ rights, abortion, and atheism often conflict with the views of these immigrant groups. A huge number of immigrants voted for Rob Ford, for instance.

Support for multi-culturalism/diversity is the one area where it's Montreal that's the most conservative of the 3 big cities. Some of it is due to Quebec not signing the 1982 Canadian Constitution which includes the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Charter fundamentally changed how Canadians viewed their country. As Quebec never signed this didn't happen in Quebec. By extension, multiculturalism is less ingrained there.

Quebecois have historically felt the french fact under threat in an anglo north America so multiculturalism/diversity is seen as another threat rather than a benefit. Quebecois are far more likely to desire that newcomers adhere to entrenched behaviour when it comes to language, religion, dress, customs, traditions, past times.

Anglo Canadians are far less likely to define their nationality by language and culture but by a shared set of Canadian values as hashed out in the Charter. I'm a child of the Charter and view it as what defines me as a Canadian rather than language, playing hockey, or being a Christian. It's a very post-modern way of defining nationality; one that is diametrically opposed to how nationality is defined in other countries.

Trump did better in the NYC metro than the other 3 and its not close. Trump did better in the NYC suburban counties than Illinois ones. Though it was clearly a home state boost. The Nassau County Republican Party endorsed Trump early on; county executive endorsed both Trump and Cuomo.

Trump didn't win a single ward in Chicago

http://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/...lts-President/

he won a number of NYC neighborhoods outside of the Hasidic neighborhoods, and narrowly lost a few more

https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/num...al-primary-nyc

New York. People tend to think it is a liberal progressive mecca. It's not. It has pockets of very progressive areas with progressive city leaders (though they also had Giuliani and Bloomberg) but it's always been overall pretty moderate sending moderate left representatives to Albany and DC.

Some of them even right-wing nut jobs. Anyone remember Alphonse D'Amato? I won't get into the president-elect.

The Trump vote is a terrible proxy for making a determination on which city is the most conservative. But that's another topic.


If a first-time visitor with no prior knowledge of each were to spend 2 days in each city, Chicago would likely feel the most "conservative", given its "Midwestern sensibilities", and relative orderliness and normalcy in comparison to NYC and LA.

i'm proud to say that my majority white ward (the 48th) voted 86% - 10% for clinton.



what the fuck are they putting in the water on staten island? jesus.

Spaghetti sauce

Interestingly enough, more Chicagoans voted for Hillary than Obama in 2012.
https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/num...al-primary-nyc

I'm also glad that Chicago had to split hairs down to the precinct level to find areas that majority voted for Trump

^ that has more to do with the way ward boundaries are drawn in Chicago, though. There's sort of an unspoken 3-way balance between white, black and Latino wards. Some enclaves of those groups are diluted by gerrymandering to maintain the overall balance. Trump probably could have picked up a ward or two if the boundaries were drawn differently.

You're making an assumption that a higher % of Trump voters is a proxy for "more conservative". Trump isn't a a traditional candidate, and doesn't espouse typical conservative policy stances. His support doesn't follow traditional cleavages.

And the non-Hasidic neighborhoods in NYC where Trump won also don't exist in Chicago. The other neighborhoods are dominated by former Soviets or Southern Italians.

The outer Chicago neighborhoods have a very different typology. They're basically "cop neighborhoods" and tend to vote Dem, but are quite conservative by most measures. Again, I'm highly skeptical an Irish-American cop/firefighter neighborhood in Chicago is more liberal than an Italian or Russian neigborhood in NYC, even if the Presidential voting patterns differ somewhat.

That doesn't make any sense as 1. NY State had a significantly lower proportion of Trump voters than Illinois and 2. About half the NYC metro isn't in NY State.

Trump did (relatively) well on Long Island because of the unique demographics, not because of a home-state advantage. Long Island has tons of Orthodox Jews, South Italians and Russians. If you draw down to census tract you see he won where those groups predominate. Note that Westchester had few Trump voters; it also doesn't have nearly as many such ethnic enclaves.

If anything, Trump is least popular where he's best known (he got destroyed in Manhattan; I think worse than any urban county in the U.S.).

doubtful.

even in the conservative "cop & fireman" 41st ward on the far NW side (82% white and the only ward in the city with a republican alderman) trump came closer to winning there than any other ward in chicago, but he still lost by 9 points.

looking at the precinct map results, i don't know how you'd gerrymander that one even more to make up a 9 point deficit.

the city of chicago made it very clear that it despises the overgrown oompa-loompa. even in the most conservative ward in the whole city, it still wasn't close.

The cop/firefighters neighborhoods in NYC region, at least white ones went heavily for Trump. I'm a bit surprised the same wasn't true of Chicago; isn't that kinda Trump's base? I'm not familiar enough with Chicago to really judge by culture.

I guess there's several different ways to answer the question: using the most recent election, previous election, or some more qualitative feel answer.

Perhaps I should have said Trump did better in NYC suburbs than in Chicago suburbs. Trump did better in NYC than Chicago proper but NYC is a much larger portion of the Chicago metro area.

Long Island has some Orthodox Jews in western Nassau but otherwise not many. Can't think of where there's a large Russian population. Westchester has the most educated and professional white population of the NYC suburban counties + a large minority population. Long Island is more typical of the white population of the region than Westchester is, it's not that unique. Manhattan is heavily transplant, not sure if it's fair to say it's where "he's best known".

Staten Island was Trump's best county in the primaries. Though the media focused on Appalachia counties for articles about "Trump's best counties" in the primary season.

exactly. thats what you get when ny runs the media for ya. they can ignore staten island and deflect focus on appalachia, the west, the midwest, etc.. is it any wonder trump's win caught the manhattan-centric parochial national media business here so off guard? its a peeve and it makes me sick sometimes how biased and lazy it can be. my favorite bias is from back when the ny/nj waterfront had industrial pollution fires going somewhere every day into the 1980s, but oh no cleveland has one effing fire in the cuyahoga river and it's the burning water city.
:haha: :shrug:

interesting never heard it was so bad. You got any good links on that?

But seeing "NY reporter goes to Trump country"; usually involving going 100s of miles away was so absurd when they could go 20 miles away. Staten Island is probably less unrepresentative of US politics.

Staten Island is geographically close to Monmouth and Ocean County NJ, both of which voted for Trump.

In addition, on Long Island, Trump easily won highly populated Suffolk County, lost Nassau, but if you combine Suffolk with Nassau, Trump's margin of victory is 603,900 votes to HRC's 584,200 or 19,700 more votes.

With that said, I don't believe the recent Presidential election results is an accurate barometer for measuring a region's level of conservatism.

Yeah that reporter could've driven to Putnam or Orange counties as well.

of course he would win orange county. probably also took giant comb-over county

He was/is a rockstar in Upstate New York. I was back home for my gran's funeral a few months ago and I noticed far more Trump signs (sometimes multiples in the same yard) than anywhere around here in TX. My wife, a Texan, even noted this as well. Had it not been NYC, NYS would have probably voted for Trump or been a very very close race. Like Florida close.

Much like Pennsylvania... except PA did go for the buffoon thanks to normally solid blue suburbs and the always red rural areas. Signs were everywhere, particularly noticeable once you got about 2 miles outside of any city. Blue collar (former) democrats there voted for him in large numbers.


But how about we stop talking about this asshole?

Is it possible lawn signs aren't done that much in Texas? Where I grew up on Long Island does lawn signs less New England. I saw lots of Trump signs in rural New England even though he lost there.

Saw someone do the numbers for NY State, and with NY City removed, Trump would have lost slightly. 2012 Obama won upstate NY by about 9 points or so.

Is there a difference between Westchester Italians and LI Italians?

Manhattan is a horrible fit for Trump, regardless of his living there.

45% of white police officers in NYC live in the city while 76% of minority police officers do

https://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/...es-they-serve/

NYPD is 55% white

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...ents.html?_r=0

Well, yeah, plenty of cops (and other city workers) live in NYC.

After all, most city workers have to live within the state during their employment (but not the city, and there are many exceptions to the state rule), and NYC comprises the majority of the population of the NYS portion of the NYC metro.

But in Chicago (and many other cities) all workers have to live in city limits, no exceptions, which creates "cop neighborhoods", usually on the city fringes. NYC doesn't have an exact equivalent. In Chicago 100% of city workers are in the city; in NYC maybe's it's 60%+ (if cops are representative of city worker residency). There are certain fringe neighborhoods on Staten Island and far Northeast Queens that are maybe a slightly lesser version of "cop neighborhoods", but not quite to the same extent. If you want the burbs, you can go to the burbs.

This, alongside lower immigration, and less gentrification, has also preserved a bit more of the "old school insular white ethnic neighborhood" typology in Chicago, IMO. Northeast Queens is rapidly becoming Asian. South Shore of Staten Island is still white ethnic but lightly populated. Most of formerly white ethnic Brooklyn is at least as diverse as Queens these days. Far Northeast Bronx was white ethnic; now looks like Queens. If a neighborhood is cheap and safe and within 50 miles of Times Square it will get immigrants.