Will Biden flip Inyo County, CA?

[E-Dawg]

Inyo County is in the Sierra Nevada region bordering Nevada, and it is extremely sparsely populated with only 18,000 people. The county has voted consistently Republican, with Trump winning by a 13 point margin in 2016, which was about the same margin as in past elections. However, the current results in the county show Biden leading 54.2%-43.7% with 66% of the vote in. I find this interesting because Mono and Alpine, the two fellow sparsely populated counties bordering Nevada, also used to be very Republican. However, those two counties have become very Democratic in recent years, and I don't know why that is and am wondering if Inyo will do the same. Do you guys think Biden will maintain his lead and flip Inyo, or do you think the current count is a fluke? I'm happy to hear any theories on what may be the cause of this potential flip.

[E-Dawg]

I would be surprised if Inyo stayed Democratic when all votes are counted. Unlike Mono and Alpine Counties, there is not a major ski resort in Inyo County. Teton County, WY; Blaine County, ID; Park County, UT; and a lot of Colorado counties are heavily Democratic because they have ski resorts.

Looking at the numbers in two previous elections:
2016: 4,248 (Trump) to 3,155 (Clinton) plus some third party vote
2018 - Gov: 4,018 (Cox, Republican) to 3,244 (Newsom, Democratic) with no third party vote

Now, with ~66% reporting, we have 3,443 for Biden and 2,776 for Trump. That’s a lot of ground (1,500 or so votes) that Trump would have to make up unopposed to meet previous Republican benchmarks.

I’m a believer in the idea that, with changes in CA law for 2020 regarding counting mail-in ballots, that we might not see the long tail of Democratic-leaning results that characterized California reporting for the last several elections (and maybe before I followed it closely). Now, the mail-in ballots could at least be somewhat processed before Election Day, leading to a lot more votes being counted and reported on the night of Election Day. It should help reduce California’s reputation for taking ages to count votes, but it might mess with known reporting patterns.

TL;DR: Inyo County doesn’t have the defining characteristic of liberal mountain-west counties (ski resort(s)), but Biden has done quite well on the initial count and we could see a big swing here. All of that depends on the remaining ballots though.

I have noticed that the count in the counties in the south of the Central Valley where I live (Tulare, Kern, Kings) have become more Republican as votes keep being counted, so there's probably a good chance Inyo will remain Republican, though it looks like the margin would still be surprisingly close.

[E-Dawg]

Environmentalists and national park rangers don’t like anti-science, climate change denying politicians.

That may be the case for some people in Inyo, but the county has consistently voted Republican by about by over 10 point margins, even for Trump in 2016. Why would the people in Inyo have flipped parties now and not sooner?

[E-Dawg]

Currently, there are now 4,623 Biden votes and 4,611 Trump votes. I don't know now many raw votes are left to be counted, but it looks like this county may stay with Trump after all.

[E-Dawg]

Inyo being blue honestly makes the California county map more aesthetically pleasing IMO.

[E-Dawg]

Does anyone know how many votes are left in the county to be counted? Count hasnt updated in like a week.

[E-Dawg]

Inyo has its final results report up.

Biden flipped the county by fourteen votes, 4,634 to 4,620.

Damn that was close. Its pretty sad that it took a whole month to know for sure. Oh well, California is still quicker at this than New York.

[E-Dawg]

Why did this county flip even as california swung and trended R this cycle?

CA didn't swing R.

Yes it did. Hillary won the state by a margin of 30.1%, and with 99% of precincts reporting Biden won the state by 29.2%. I highly doubt the 1% of precincts remaining would be strong enough for Biden to change this, as California's votes has become more Republican as more votes have been reported, much like in Arizona.

[E-Dawg]

Why did this county flip even as california swung and trended R this cycle?

CA didn't swing R.

Yes it did. Hillary won the state by a margin of 30.1%, and with 99% of precincts reporting Biden won the state by 29.2%. I highly doubt the 1% of precincts remaining would be strong enough for Biden to change this, as California's votes has become more Republican as more votes have been reported, much like in Arizona.

Doesn't count. Not a swing, in my opinion.

Yes, it is objectively a swing. Yes, it is a very small swing and it is reasonable to find it to be noise that doesn't carry much meaning. However, that doesn't change the fact that it is objectively a slight GOP swing and claiming that it didn't happen is inaccurate. Be more careful in your wording.

[E-Dawg]

A less than 1% swing (in any direction) is nothing to me. Just noise.

Words have meanings. A 0.00000000000000001 point swing to the GOP is still a swing to the GOP. You are wrong by definition.

If you had said "CA didn't swing R by a significant amount", I would have agreed with you, but right now you're just not making sense.

Why did this county flip even as california swung and trended R this cycle?

CA didn't swing R.

Yes it did. Hillary won the state by a margin of 30.1%, and with 99% of precincts reporting Biden won the state by 29.2%. I highly doubt the 1% of precincts remaining would be strong enough for Biden to change this, as California's votes has become more Republican as more votes have been reported, much like in Arizona.

Doesn't count. Not a swing, in my opinion.

Yes, it is objectively a swing. Yes, it is a very small swing and it is reasonable to find it to be noise that doesn't carry much meaning. However, that doesn't change the fact that it is objectively a slight GOP swing and claiming that it didn't happen is inaccurate. Be more careful in your wording.

LOL, it's not a big deal. Like DrScholl said, it's an "insignificant swing".

Are both of you happy now? Geez.

Yes, its an important clarification, since you said twice that "it wasn't a swing." If you don't want this to happen again then don't double down on false statements.