Francophone majority townships in Maine

[Geoffrey Howe]

I do think it's fair to say these places swung fairly hard to Kerry. Aroostook County, ME swung 4 points to Kerry, and the southern, Republican part probably saw a swing to Bush in line with similar places, or at least stayed put; meaning the northern Francophone parts swung fairly hard to Kerry.

But let's take a look at Berlin, NH near the border with Québec. According to Wikipedia two-thirds there speak some dialect of French and in 2000 63.4% had French or French-Canadian ancestry:
                                                     
1996    23.13%   61.21%
2000    38.01%   58.57% 
2004    35.75%   63.59% 

that makes a 7.28 point swing to Kerry.


As for the suggestions that Francophones would not have liked the atmosphere around Iraq and Chirac staying out, I do give this some credence. Even if you view yourself as simply American rather than Franco-American, it would be hard not to feel somewhat alienated as a French speaker, or indeed embarrassed to be one.