2020 Presidential Election Results by Top 50 MSA

[BG918]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Trump isn't very popular with the military, so it isn't very surprising that Biden performed better than expected in San Diego.

This was evident in Colorado Springs too. Trump still won El Paso County but the margin of victory was only 11 points vs 22 points in 2016

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by ChiSoxRox

Salt Lake City's numbers are helped by the MSA just being the Jordan Valley part of the Wasatch Front. Provo is a separate MSA, and it's a rather different story:

that's a solid point.

MSAs are not all created equally.

looking at the data in Manitopiaaa's awesome table, you would see that SLC's MSA was more blue than St. louis' by a handful of points (+9 vs. +3).

however, the SLC MSA consists of only Salt Lake County and the very sparsely populated Tooele County to its west. that's it. one highly urbanized/suburbanized central county and then a gigantic unpopulated desert. nothing else.

all of the very red and highly populated counties directly adjacent to the north and south of salt lake county are in the separate ogden and provo MSAs.

the st. louis MSA, on the other hand sprawls across 15 counties (and the independent city of st. louis) in MO and IL, deep into SOLID red rural farm country in all directions.

that's not really apples to apples for comparative purposes.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Trump isn't very popular with the military, so it isn't very surprising that Biden performed better than expected in San Diego.

And San Diego is highly educated, lots of knowledge-economy jobs and very suburban-moderate, culturally. It's a pretty poor fit for Trumpism.

I still think we're conflating liberal-conservative with Trumpist-establishment, though. I don't think it's unfair to label San Diego as conservative. The GOP can win San Diego. But it isn't fertile territory for populism.

[Sam Hill]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

as for SD, these days i think it gets pegged with the "conservative" rep simply because it isn't as ragingly blue as its bigger cali cousins: LA and the bay area.

anytime you can get a large metro area of some 3M people to go +23 for team blue, it's very hard to consider it a hotbed of conservatism.

I think it gets pegged as conservative because for the longest time it was indeed a conservative military town, and so many people still erroneously think of it that way. I lived there for five years during the Obama era - when it was turning blueish purple and there was a lot of talk about how quickly it was changing into a more progressive town with more of a tech economy. I was a newcomer and didn't quite get what all the hubbub was about.

[Manitopiaaa]

Originally Posted by Sam Hill

I think it gets pegged as conservative because for the longest time it was indeed a conservative military town, and so many people still erroneously think of it that way. I lived there for five years during the Obama era - when it was turning blueish purple and there was a lot of talk about how quickly it was changing into a more progressive town with more of a tech economy. I was a newcomer and didn't quite get what all the hubbub was about.

San Diego County voted for Bush in 2004 by a 52-46 margin even.

The County has been zooming left:
1980: 27% Democratic (-14% below national share)
1984: 33% Democratic (-8%)
1988: 38% Democratic (-8%)
1992: 37% Democratic (-6%)
1996: 44% Democratic (-5%)
2000: 46% Democratic (-2%)
2004: 46% Democratic (-2%)
2008: 54% Democratic (+1%)
2012: 53% Democratic (+2%)
2016: 56% Democratic (+8%)
2020: 60% Democratic (+9%)

It is still to the right of California though.

[Docere]

The Republicans were much more of a Western-based party during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s (Nixon and Reagan were Californians).

[BnaBreaker]

Originally Posted by Crawford

People are always talking about Nashville is this huge progressive/hipster mecca, with a dash of Hollywood. It's a deep red metro. I always got the sense it was extremely right wing overall.

Originally Posted by homebucket

Yeah you would think Nashville would be more in line with Austin, since they're so often compared to each other. But it's not even like Charlotte, Phoenix, Houston, etc.

I mean, Davidson County/Nashville city went 64% to Biden so you could say that the city proper is, relatively speaking anyway, "progressive" (although I don't know why anyone would call it a "progressive mecca.") But yeah, as this graphic shows, the suburbs are still quite red unfortunately... although I don't think that invalidates any of the Austin comparisons or what have you, as when people think of Nashville and Austin they're referring to... Nashville and Austin, not some far flung town at the end of the metro area.

[Sam Hill]

This is a great thread so far (although, considering the subject matter, it could go down the tubes at any moment).

It's interesting to see data that pertains to metros instead of just cities. Within my insular urban world it sort of feels like the whole metropolis is a dark blue island in the middle of a great red sea, and once one ventures out beyond the island's shores one abruptly enters Trump country. But there's really more of a gradient. The island is dark blue in the center but transitions to various shades of purple closer to the shores, which gradually melt into the red sea.

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by Manitopiaaa

San Diego County voted for Bush in 2004 by a 52-46 margin even.

The County has been zooming left:
1980: 27% Democratic (-14% below national share)
1984: 33% Democratic (-8%)
1988: 38% Democratic (-8%)
1992: 37% Democratic (-6%)
1996: 44% Democratic (-5%)
2000: 46% Democratic (-2%)
2004: 46% Democratic (-2%)
2008: 54% Democratic (+1%)
2012: 53% Democratic (+2%)
2016: 56% Democratic (+8%)
2020: 60% Democratic (+9%)

It is still to the right of California though.

Similar story in Orange county which flipped blue for the first time since the depression in 2016, then went 100% blue in congressional seats in the 2018 midterms. It was a sign of things to come for 2020.


https://www.npr.org/2018/11/20/66933...-orange-county

[Sam Hill]

Originally Posted by Docere

The Republicans were much more of a Western-based party during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s (Nixon and Reagan were Californians).

The whole tax revolt that would soon become a pillar of modern conservatism, and plant a seed that would eventually grow into the Tea Party, started in California with the now infamous Prop 13, in 1978. It's amazing how much things have changed.

[badrunner]

The party of Nixon and Reagan is gone. Republicans are the party of Trump now.

[Steely Dan]

Am i the only one who enjoys the proportion inversion of ohio's 3 C's, from Cleveland down to Cincy?

City - biden/trump

Cleveland - 57.25/42.75

Columbus - 54.00/46.00

Cincinnati - 42.81/57.81

[gunna]

Originally Posted by badrunner

Similar story in Orange county which flipped blue for the first time since the depression in 2016, then went 100% blue in congressional seats in the 2018 midterms. It was a sign of things to come for 2020.


https://www.npr.org/2018/11/20/66933...-orange-county

Two of those seats just flipped back to red. CA-39 and CA-48.

[Buckeye Native 001]

Not surprised. 39 is Yorba Linda and Anaheim Hills, IIRC?

48 includes Huntington and Newport Beach. Arrested Development (at least, seasons 1 through 3) did a really good job of satirizing the kind of assholes who live in coastal Orange County.

[Buckeye Native 001]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Am i the only one who enjoys the proportion inversion of ohio's 3 C's, from Cleveland down to Cincy?

City - biden/trump

Cleveland - 57.25/42.75

Columbus - 54.00/46.00

Cincinnati - 42.81/57.81

I'm terrible at math, but I'm a little surprised Biden's numbers in Cincinnati were that bad, or am I not correctly understanding something?

Hamilton County's been blue since 2008 and Cincinnati itself is relatively Democratic, but the suburbs, especially in Butler, Warren and Clermont counties are ruby red.

[Jawnadelphia]

Originally Posted by Buckeye Native 001

I'm terrible at math, but I'm a little surprised Biden's numbers in Cincinnati were that bad, or am I not correctly understanding something?

Hamilton County's been blue since 2008 and Cincinnati itself is relatively Democratic, but the suburbs, especially in Butler, Warren and Clermont counties are ruby red.

This is just my experience as a Biden volunteer, but with Covid, the campaign really limited their canvassing (door to door) to only the "Blue Wall" - PA, MI, WI areas as far as I know. They did not focus on OH, FL, TX with boots on the ground, as I think they realized those states were uphill battles, and knew winning back PA/WI/MI with the Hillary states from 2016 was enough to get to 279. GA flipping is really the work of Stacey Abrams and the home grown grassroots efforts going on in that state for the last decade. AZ, I think was pushed over the top by the Native American vote, and Phoenix suburbs that now look a lot more like heavily Democratic, younger, diverse voter we are seeing in the Atlanta suburbs, and Harris County, TX.

I don't know enough about Ohio, but it just seems the older, white "blue collar" voter which I think still dominates much of OH is so far up Trump's ass there was no way that state was turning blue without vast resources being used in the Buckeye State. And the Biden campaign I think determined focusing on PA/MI/WI was the way to go.

[jtown,man]

The military doesn't like Trump? Could someone please link some actual data, because I am not understanding that at all.

What people don't realize, because the media is incredibly bias, is that Trump has been wonderful for the military. People think those in the military love war or some, they don't. Trump has done better than any president in the last few decades by keeping us out of new conflicts or growing old ones. Military members appreciate that. And that carries more weight than Trump being at odds with top brass or whatever, they care about if they will be sent on deployment, not if Trump and the Pentagon are having a childish fight.

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

The military doesn't like Trump? Could someone please link some actual data, because I am not understanding that at all.

What people don't realize, because the media is incredibly bias, is that Trump has been wonderful for the military. People think those in the military love war or some, they don't. Trump has done better than any president in the last few decades by keeping us out of new conflicts or growing old ones. Military members appreciate that. And that carries more weight than Trump being at odds with top brass or whatever, they care about if they will be sent on deployment, not if Trump and the Pentagon are having a childish fight.

Pretty sure Trump's popularity with the branches of the military declined consistently over his term. There were numerous polls over this past year that supported that... do a quick search on trump military popularity... not hard to find numbers if that's what you're looking for.

From what I recall seeing/reading over the past year, is that polls of military servicemembers showed a less than 50% approval rating -- that is an unprecedented lack of support for a Republican president.

One of the only things I like about Trump is that he is not a hawk... and has maintained consistency in his aversion to military intervention all over the world. Whether or not that veering off from the traditional Republican-neocon military strategy is effective or damaging in the near and long terms, remains to be seen.

[Steely Dan]

Speaking of vote proportion inversions, I like this near perfect one between illinois and indiana.

State - biden / trump

IL - 57.2 / 40.8

IN - 40.9 / 57.0


The power of a super-alpha metro on full display.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

The military doesn't like Trump? Could someone please link some actual data, because I am not understanding that at all.

What people don't realize, because the media is incredibly bias, is that Trump has been wonderful for the military. People think those in the military love war or some, they don't. Trump has done better than any president in the last few decades by keeping us out of new conflicts or growing old ones. Military members appreciate that. And that carries more weight than Trump being at odds with top brass or whatever, they care about if they will be sent on deployment, not if Trump and the Pentagon are having a childish fight.