The strongest bellwether counties are those that back the winning candidate in all elections. These counties arent the only ones that matter most swing states have a handful of critical counties, not just one or two but these 25 stand out, either for their voting history, population size or traditional impact on swing-state election results. But it's still indicative of widespread support. What results did you discover? But those states represent just 29, 18and six electoral votes, respectively. 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. (Go to the bottom of the page. Other counties to watch: Often early results in Michigan will show a close race or Republicans ahead, until the Detroit area votes come in. Ultimately, they are simply 19 counties and this time, 18 of them voted for the candidate who lost the election. While Clinton has family ties to the coal-producing region her father was born in neighboring Scranton mid-July polling from a GOP pollster suggests Trump is winning big here. Biden-voting counties equal 70% of America's economy. But theres a blue collar contingent too who feel like theyre being ignored, according to county Democratic Chairman Marty Martinez. There are more than 3,000 counties in the United States, but in presidential elections they are not all created equal. The Atlantic wonders why we're still arguing about masks. That's 14 in a row. 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. 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. The fact that there are fewer swing counties means that there are fewer potential bellwether counties. The 2020 election appears to illustrate that the partisanship that's defined politics in Washington for years has now spread to small-town America. 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. Share your comments below or join the related discussion on Gitlab. America's most accurate bellwether counties, regions that have a reputation for accurately picking the president, got the presidential election completely wrong. It is important to realise these counties have no allegiances whatsoever and will happily vote for whichever party makes the most sense to them based on merit. So those suburban whites are key here and might tell a story not just about who wins the state, but who wins nationally. Read about our approach to external linking. Follow us on Telegram to be notified when we release the remaining articles. Seven counties, including Vigo, have got it right in the past dozen elections. There are 25 counties with a Democrat percentage vote over 60%. Pittsburghs Allegheny County, the second-most populous county in the state after Philadelphia, is heavily Democratic. The statistics also are not indicative of electoral fraud. Marcela Stewart speaks to a voter at an event to encourage minority voter turnout n Cutler Bay, Fla., on Sunday. A swing county is a county that voted correctly for the winning party at one election and then voted for the other winning party at the next election. But that's no longer the case. A majority of voters here had backed the eventual winner of presidential elections every time since 1964. We have looked at every imaginable scenario to build a case for the Democrat party winning the 2020 election based upon how our trusted counties voted. Combined, they had more than twice the votes of Denver proper and 30 percent of all the votes statewide. 8. 03:30. Trump is making a hard play here; His first visit to Iowa after accepting the nomination at the Republican National Convention was in Scott County. Latest voter registration totals:Democrats: 316,586Republicans: 258,725No Party Affiliation: 206,457Others: 22,695. Along with neighboring Pinellas County (St. Petersburg), the two counties include nearly a half-million registered Republicans. Watch the margins in Story (Ames) and Scott (Davenport). A total of 35 counties voted for the winner of each presidential election from 1980 through 2012. GOP Chairman Dale Fellows noted that the population has been steadily aging in recent years. Of these 35 counties, 10 of them consistently voted over 50% for the winning candidate since the year 2000. North Carolina (15 electoral votes) - Toss-up Bellwether: Watauga In the western mountains on the border with Tennessee, it's home to Boone, which includes Appalachian State. Here are the counties that consistently voted more than 50% for the winning party since the 2000 election: To make things a little more interesting we will relax the constraints a little to include modern bellwether counties, that is, counties that have voted for the winning candidate since 1992. 2016 winners: Bernie Sanders (Democratic caucus); Ted Cruz (GOP state convention) . View our How You Can Help page, or contribute via Election bellwether counties in the United States are counties that vote in alignment with the country as a whole in United States presidential elections, so that the county votes for the candidate who ultimately wins the election. New Hampshire (4 electoral votes) - Lean Democratic. Statewide results: 2012: Obama 54%-45% - 2008: Obama 57%-41%. The users have not responded to requests from USA TODAY for comment. (Sorry, not sorry.) The most impressive of those was Valencia County, New Mexico, which voted for the victor in every presidential election from 1952 to 2016. From 1980 through 2016, there were19 counties that consistently voted for the eventual president. Republicans have a voter registration advantage here but in recent presidential elections, its had consistently tight margins: In 2012 Obama won it by less than 4,000 votes. PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY EMILY SCHERER / GETTY IMAGES. The following county is the only county to have voted for the winner of the presidential election in every election starting in 1980: The following 44 counties have deviated from the winner of the presidential election in one election since 1980 (no counties deviated from the winner in 1980, 1984, or 1996):[3][4]. 2016 winners: Bernie Sanders (Democratic caucus); Ted Cruz (GOP state convention)2012: Obama 51%, Romney 46%, Latestvoter registration totals:Unaffiliated: 128,938Republicans: 111,374Democrats: 109,140Libertarian: 3,388. And as was true in 2016, those counties voted substantially to the right of the nation. Trump remained very strong with white voters without a college degree in 2020, helping him win Iowa and Ohio by comfortable margins and remain competitive in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton need to shore up their bases here in a place where there are more unaffiliated voters than Republicans or Democrats and major party registration is at near parity. In economics, a 'bellwether' is a leading indicator of an economic trend. It went with the exact margin for Romney in 2012 statewide and McCain statewide in 2008. After Detroits Wayne County, Oakland County is the most-populous in the state. It has gone with the statewide winner in every presidential election since 2000. Trump remained very strong with white voters without a college degree in 2020, helping him win Iowa and Ohio by comfortable margins and remain competitive in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Obama won both with 56 percent; if Trump is making them competitive, that could mean Iowa goes his way. It's happened before. More Than Half of U.S. Population in 4.6 Percent of Counties, Fact check: Clarifying the comparison between popular vote and counties won in the 2020 election, Bellwether Counties Nearly Wiped Out by 2020 Election, Americas bellwethers crumbled in aligning with Trump in 20. Trump appears likely to lose many moderate Republicans here but his message is also expected to appeal to white working class voters in Lower Bucks County, closer to the city. Tampa's Hillsborough County is a top bellwether -- since 1960, no candidate has won Florida . Recently, though, social media users have shared a meme with statistics that they claim discredits his victory. Latest voter registration totals:Democrats: 480,926Republicans, 323,870Unaffiliated: 229,298Others: 65,281. Her running mate Tim Kaine the former Richmond mayor and Virginia governor could make a difference here, Latest voter registration totals: 230,236No party registration, Loudoun County flipped from red to blue in 2008, when Barack Obama won it and held it in 2012. Lets rank these counties from highest to lowest Democrat voting percentages in the 2008 election. It very closely mirrors the rest of the state demographically (with a slightly higher Asian population), but it is far more educated. A Changing America Faces A Stark Choice This Election. Democrats Woodrow Wilson, John F. Kennedy, Bill Clinton and Grover Cleveland (twice) won elections while losing ground in the House, per The Atlantic. As long as a candidate wins enough electoral votes from other states, there is noreason it's impossible to win an election while losing Florida, Ohio, or Iowa. Those places will get the bulk of the presidential candidates time and their surrounding media markets will get the bulk of the television ad spending. Its also loaded with government contractors and defense companies hit hard by the sequester. It's true that it is unusual for the party of thecandidate who wins the White House to lose seats in the House of Representatives. The most impressive of those was Valencia County, New Mexico, which voted for the victor in. That Trump did so well in the remaining 19 bellwether counties in 2020 should come as no surprise, then. (See the DPV 08 column in the image below.) But in 2020, 18 of these 19 bellwether counties voted for former President Donald Trump. To make things more interesting we will only look at swing counties since the 2004 election. Here, local Republican candidates fuelled by Mr Trump's firebrand style almost wiped Democrats off the local political map. The fourth-largest county in the state, its home to the Green Bay Packers, which are a huge economic engine. In fact, a national coalition of election security officials described the general election as "the most secure in American history," per USA TODAY. We believe this was a mistake. 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. In communities . You should now have a real tangible sense of how difficult it is to get a streak of 10. "I think people were pretty happy with some of the things he's done, what he's been able to accomplish," says Mark Coppeler, a leading local Republican who was re-elected county commissioner last month. 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. ), You can find the answers to the above questions yourself by searching this site: politico.com/2020-election/results But that changed in 2016 when Trump made huge gains with white voters without a college degree. There are 22 counties in the US that managed to vote for the winning party in every single election from 1988 to 2016. Compiled by Si Williams, non-US resident, and other contributors. According to PolitiFact, voter turnout was66.2% in 2020 and 61.6% in 2008. Georgia (16 electoral votes) - Lean Republican. In fact, they became even more Republican the average bellwether county from 1980 to 2016 voted 18.2 points to the right of the nation. Weeks after Election Day, there have still been no discoveriesof widespread voter fraud. Bonus points if you also keep track of the trends from 2016 to 2020. Nobody forgot about politics.". By Dasha Burns, Antonia Hylton, Shaquille Brewster and Benjy Sarlin. Again, youll appreciate the results when you dig some of them up yourself. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. "When I came here in 1989, you couldn't be elected dog catcher if you weren't a Democrat," he says. Other counties to watch: Palm Beach and Miami-Dade are both places where Clinton has to drive up the score. We wanted to provide an easy-to-use guide of which counties to keep tabs on that could tell you how states might vote that are crucial to the election. In fact, they became even more Republican the average bellwether county from 1980 to 2016 voted 18.2 points to the right of the nation. Trump, however, needs to drive up the score in Collin (Plano). Trump won Luzerne County by nearly 20 points in 2016, outperforming Romney . Only one of them, Washington state's Clallam County, backed. We organized this by poll-closing time (all in Eastern time for the latest poll-closing times in that state), so you can follow along as the night goes: 1. "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. Also key is Larimer (Fort Collins). Jacksonvilles Duval County has been a reliable Republican performer over the years, though it nearly went for Obama in 2008 in large part due to high African-American turnout. 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. Ultimately, of course, Trumps strong performance in these counties didnt matter because of Bidens gains in the more highly educated suburbs of Milwaukee, Grand Rapids and Philadelphia. [How The Frost Belt And Sun Belt Illustrate The Complexity Of Americas Urban-Rural Divide]. It will keep them entertained for hours, and you can tell them it is for a good cause. Learn how and when to remove this template message, "How many counties are in the United States? Here are the concepts we have established so far: This is just the beginning. ), Fact check: Biden won the most total votes and the fewest total counties of any president-elect. Re-doing the analysis we obtain 35 modern bellwether counties after the 2016 election. Bucks has three times the voters than its neighboring county to the north. Republicans have paid some attention. Ron Elving . The second-most populous county in the state, northern Nevadas Washoe County is home to Reno. With demographic change in the Research Triangle area, though, it's possible for Clinton to win without this smaller county. It's true that the report first showed Biden at 477 counties andTrump at 2,497 counties, though ithas since been updated to showBiden at 509 andTrump at 2,547. Watauga has gone for the winner statewide in each of the last three presidential elections and three Senate races since 2008. The table shows the number of counties that voted for the winning candidate since the 1988 election. Pennsylvania (20 electoral votes) - Lean Democratic. And like so many electoral trends, demographics play a major role in explaining why these once-bellwether counties finally missed the mark in 2020. Trump won 18 of the 19. ", "Bellwether Counties Nearly Wiped Out by 2020 Election", "Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_election_bellwether_counties_in_the_United_States&oldid=1125445752, This page was last edited on 4 December 2022, at 01:36. Lets quickly recap what we have established so far: In this post we will further relax the constraint by analyzing counties that voted Democrat in 2008 and Republican in 2016 only; that is, the switch counties in the most recent elections. Republicans are bullish that the suburban county will stay in their column this time, in part because of frustration with Washington. Click here, for more. Until this year. The magnitude of the gap (or difference) is an indicator of the strength of the change in sentiment. . There are a total of 3,142 counties or county equivalents in the United States.[1]. Will they vote for the winner in 2016? That report was issued on Nov. 12. Racine County, which features a significant Hispanic and African American population, is the only competitive county bordering Milwaukee Ozaukee, Waukesha and Washington counties are reliably Republican. The matters that way on their minds are real. Ryan Matsumoto is a contributing analyst for Inside Elections. Unfortunately, Github (now a Microsoft company) terminated this website's account on 13 Jan 2021 for "spreading misinformation", a violation of their terms, although no specific examples were given. Democrats also have to win big in Mecklenburg (Charlotte), Guilford (Greensboro), Durham and Buncombe (Asheville). 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. Oct. 28, 2021, 11:05 AM PDT. The more people can work out and see for themselves that the data clearly indicates a different outcome, the better. Co., as its sometimes referred to, has gone more closely for the statewide winner than any other big county. Other counties to watch: Remarkably, Obama won every county in this state in 2008. One of the big four suburban collar counties ringing Philadelphia and the fourth-most populous county in the state Bucks is always competitive. If it's close here, Georgia could be in play. Yet Donald Trump received 10 million more votes in 2020 than in 2016 -- and lost. (subject to censorship). Allegheny (Pittsburgh) is also key for Democrats. In fact, according to David Wasserman of The Cook Political Report, just 303 counties were decided by single-digit margins in 2016, compared to 1,096 counties that fit that description in 1992. Moving forward, it is entirely possible that there will be no single county that consistently indicates the results of a national election. "That didn't happen after 2016," she adds. Shield icon by Freepik from flaticon.com. He will need to cut into Clintons advantage here in North Carolinas second-most populous county since Clinton is likely to roll up the score in Democratic Mecklenburg County (Charlotte). She blames much of that on the "Trump effect" - Mr Trump's ability to engage people in politics by appealing to their fears and discontents. There are 391 such counties. We tried to pick counties that had a large enough population to matter some or if they just had a knack for picking that statewide winner. It provided the second highest vote totals of any county and a significant share for Democrats. Other counties to watch: Nowhere is more important than Polk (Des Moines). Demographics (84) Trumps local ties notwithstanding, Clinton is likely to run up her numbers here in the northernmost part of the South Florida region. Virginia (13 electoral votes) - Lean Democratic. 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 For Trump to win, he has to carry this populous Detroit suburb. "There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised," they concluded. If they are tipping to Clinton, it's over. For the mathematically-minded: the table below shows that county outcomes do loosely follow a random outcome, up until a point. Lake County is a perpetual nail-biter. Like Texas, Utah looks like it's receded from the battleground, so we don't include it in our 13 battlegrounds. This populous, longtime Republican county has shifted in the last two presidential elections, as demograpic change has swept the metro Atlanta area. John King has identified as key in the 2016 election. In 1960, President John F. Kennedy lostall three states and won the White House, beating out future President Richard Nixon, according toSnopes. The Bellwether County to Watch in Pennsylvania . One of the highest income counties in the nation and a longtime GOP Midwestern stronghold, in recent years the suburban behemoth has begun trending toward Democrats -- not even Mitt Romney, who grew up here, could win it. Really stop reading. It came close to reflecting the statewide vote in 2012. She also has to run up the score in Franklin (Columbus, home to Ohio State University). It is the only county to go twice for Bush and twice for Obama. "This is an added benefit for security and resilience," they wrote. The percentage of people with college degrees here is two-thirds higher than the rest of the state. This favors the Democrat party since we are excluding counties that voted Republican in 1988. Watch the Philadelphia suburbs, and that means white women. Latestvoter registration totals:Democrats: 521,881Republicans: 248,934Unaffiliated: 66,775Other: 45,567. 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. Fifth, it listswhether each candidate's politicalparty won seats in the House of Representatives which occurred withObama andTrump, but not Biden. These are the bellwether counties. Since only Clallam County voted Democrat in 2020, we know they all voted for the Republican party in 2020 and got it wrong. In 2018, Senator Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, carried it by 11 points . . The Trump era made us rethink a lot about politics and elections in America, including the counties that are useful barometers of the national political environment. 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. These counties turned out to vote strongly for the Democrat party in 2008, so they are the most likely to swing back to the Democrat party in 2020. 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. Three-in-four votes for President Obama in 2012 came from Clark County. Outstanding. The 13 Bellwether Counties That Could Decide The Election. Maricopa (home to Phoenix) is the most populous county in the state by far 60 percent of voters live here. So the question is, how many of them switched back to the Democrat party in 2020? As weve seen in the past two presidential elections, bellwether streaks can be suddenly ended thanks to Americas continually evolving political and demographic trends. Seriously. The Biden campaign has run ads in the Toledo broadcast market, which conveniently covers part of Michigan, too. From 1980 through 2016, 19 of the nation's more than 3,000 counties voted for the eventual president in every election. Here is a quick recap of what we have established so far: We will now introduce another new concept, called a switch county. Ultimately, of course, Trumps strong performance in these counties didnt matter because of Bidens gains in the more highly educated suburbs of Milwaukee, Grand Rapids and Philadelphia. It's a largely rural area of 40,000 residents that's home to a nuclear power plant, a sprawling US National Guard training facility and islands that the British Royal Navy battled for and lost during the War of 1812. It's whiter and less Hispanic than the rest of the state, but it has a higher share of residents with college degrees. This year with Mr Trump winning the county handily, not only did Vigo County Republicans keep their seats, a "red tide" similar to what transpired in Ottawa and Valencia counties saw Republican members take positions such as county judge, treasurer, clerk and recorder. Putting names to archive photos, The children left behind in Cuba's mass exodus, In photos: India's disappearing single-screen cinemas. Second, the meme includes the number of counties each candidate won Obama at 873, Trump at 2,497 and Biden at 477. Lets introduce a new concept: the quality of prediction. Most of the statistics in the meme are true but they are not proof of voter fraud. All other 21 counties voted Republican. Since 1960, Democrats have won Rockingham County only three times. For a minute in this campaign, it looked like it could be a fairly close race in Texas, even within 5 points. How many of these counties voted less for the Republican party in 2020? 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. Much of the rest of the state is rural and ruby red Republican. 2016 winners: Bernie Sanders (Democratic caucus); Ted Cruz (GOP state convention), Latest voter registration totals:Unaffiliated: 112,113Democrats: 109,965Republicans: 100,540Libertarian: 3,009. But its not just demographic trends driving the loss of bellwether status. The American Voter's Alliance provides a great national overview with many reports, videos and detailed legal submissions. Iowa (6 electoral votes) - Lean Republican. Increased political polarization is another reason why fewer counties are consistently indicative of presidential results in recent years. Will That Last?]. "These counties, they're not real representations of America," says Mr Kreisberg of BlueLabs Analytics. But demographic change appears to have tipped the county slightly more in Democrats' direction. Cincinnati is kind of considered a little bit of an island off the rest of Ohio. From 1980 to 2016, 19 counties voted for the winner of the presidential election every single time. [How Much Did COVID-19 Affect The 2020 Election?]. They are: Notice RANSOM, SARGENT, and MARSHALL in particular. These counties' national bellwether status might not ring true in 2016, though, because Illinois is one of Obama's home states. 11. 2016 primary winners: Clinton, Trump2012: Obama 50%, Romney 49%, Latestvoter registration totals:Democrats: 192,278Republicans: 182,364Unaffiliated: 40,047Other: 29,484. The same can be said for the three states listed in the meme. Dont simply gloss over this. Arapahoe County. Or even better, if you have children, get them to do it for you. The highest percentage being 66.1%. We welcome any suggestions and content contibutions with credible references that help others understand the key election integrity issues. In 2018, Senator Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, carried it by 11 points. 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. 2016 primary winners: Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, Latest voter registration totals: Democrats: 230,401Republicans: 211,817No Party Affiliation: 102,635Others: 16,526. Asingle county could have as few as 88 residents,like Kalawao County, Hawaii.