The GOP has to expand the battleground in 2024.

[Del Tachi]

What really sucks is that the Democrats "already" have Republicans beat in sheer number of supporters and Republicans have no real chance at winning the popular vote...it's just that by coincidence the Electoral College keeps them just competitive enough to where it's possible for them to still win.

Once Texas trends D enough it's pretty much game over for Republicans, but until then they're still in the running.  Even with something like a 5% popular vote loss they can still win (which is horrible).

Also, one thing that should concern  the GOP is that they lost a trifecta in the 2020 election despite GOP turnout being like 90%+ or something crazy like that, whereas Democratic turnout was only in the mid-60s. It just seems like the line they need to walk gets thinner and thinner and they're only staying viable through a gerrymandered House, a Senate which over-represents smaller states, and an electoral college that happens to benefit them at this moment. The electoral college, however, can have pretty significant swings in who it favors in just a cycle or two, and House gerrymanders can only go so far, and often fail.

The fact is there are just more registered Ds than Rs, which means Republicans need to get Republican turnout to pretty extreme levels or win Independents, or some combination of both. Trump was able to get very high R turnout but couldn't win Independents, while many argue that a more establishment canidate may be able to win over more Independent voters but will struggle to get base turnout. I'm curious to see if their is a happy medium to this problem, and if so, how the GOP deals with it.

Cite?

[Del Tachi]

Also, the whole premise of this thread is wrong.  It is actually Democrats who need to expand their map, since the median electoral vote votes to the right of the nation overall.  The GOP's current coalition punches far above its weight.

As a gut check, ask yourself this simple question:  since 2008, which states have Democrats brought into competition?  GA and AZ?  Those gains are evened-out by GOP gains in IA and OH. 

[Del Tachi]

Also, the whole premise of this thread is wrong.  It is actually Democrats who need to expand their map, since the median electoral vote votes to the right of the nation overall.  The GOP's current coalition punches far above its weight.

As a gut check, ask yourself this simple question:  since 2008, which states have Democrats brought into competition?  GA and AZ?  Those gains are evened-out by GOP gains in IA and OH. 

If you’re including IA and OH for the GOP, then you have to add CO and VA to the Dems’ list. The former two were tossups, not safe/likely D, in the early 2000s.

Obama won VA and CO in 2008, and neither state has been truly competitive since 2012.  VA and NC may have given the GOP headaches in 2009-16, but their road to 270 doesn't require them anymore.  They've traded VA and CO for IA and OH, which the Dems themselves traded for AZ and GA.

It's all just one, constant equilibrium-inducing dance.     

[Del Tachi]

What really sucks is that the Democrats "already" have Republicans beat in sheer number of supporters and Republicans have no real chance at winning the popular vote...it's just that by coincidence the Electoral College keeps them just competitive enough to where it's possible for them to still win.

Once Texas trends D enough it's pretty much game over for Republicans, but until then they're still in the running.  Even with something like a 5% popular vote loss they can still win (which is horrible).

Also, one thing that should concern  the GOP is that they lost a trifecta in the 2020 election despite GOP turnout being like 90%+ or something crazy like that, whereas Democratic turnout was only in the mid-60s. It just seems like the line they need to walk gets thinner and thinner and they're only staying viable through a gerrymandered House, a Senate which over-represents smaller states, and an electoral college that happens to benefit them at this moment. The electoral college, however, can have pretty significant swings in who it favors in just a cycle or two, and House gerrymanders can only go so far, and often fail.

The fact is there are just more registered Ds than Rs, which means Republicans need to get Republican turnout to pretty extreme levels or win Independents, or some combination of both. Trump was able to get very high R turnout but couldn't win Independents, while many argue that a more establishment canidate may be able to win over more Independent voters but will struggle to get base turnout. I'm curious to see if their is a happy medium to this problem, and if so, how the GOP deals with it.

Cite?

The numbers are vague because their estimates and not exact amounts, but if you look at exit polls, it's about 36% of people who voted in 2020 that were registered Democrats and about 36% were registered Republican., or about 57 million each. However, nationally, party registration estimates indicates that there are about 63 million Republicans or so and 92 million Democrats. You can get these numbers by looking at states that have the party registration breakdown (about 30 states) and then estimate the rest using a correlation from the most recent election results, most of these states are smaller states anyways so there is more room for error. These numbers put Republicans at exactly 90% turnout while Democrats only at 62%. Again, these calculations are estimates, and there are many places where there is a MOE, but it can be said with relative certainty that Republicans had a higher turnout rate than Democrats in the 2020 election; it could be 86% vs 68% or 93% vs 58%, there is some room for error, but it can safely be assumed it was at least 10-15% higher.

Some people may argue "muh ancestral Democrats", but pretty much all the data we have indicates that Biden won about the same % of Republicans as Trump won of Democrats; ancestral Ds and suburbanites cancelled out.

This methodology is.....questionable, to put it politely

Self-reported partisan identification (i.e., what is used in exit polls) is much more dynamic than partisan voter registration.     

Red avatars have been singing the "demographics is destiny" song since 2005 and, as Vosem pointed out, the GOP is really in no worse position that it was 15 years ago.  If anything, their advantages in Congress and the Courts are the strongest they've been since the 1920s.