Tarrant County, Texas

[Skill and Chance]

Insight from a Tarrant County resident. Yes Democrats win the inner city areas here. The problem is, Dems get severely blown out in most suburban areas, which are a larger percentage of Tarrant County than the other urban counties. This is why Dems lose the state quite handily. The suburbs don't allow Dems to take the urban counties by the 70-30 margins they need to win statewide (let alone win Tarrant County). Fort Worth is also home to the stockyard and rodeo scene. Fort Worth and Arlington have Republican mayors. Dems have to figure out how to get suburban whites (and a surprisingly large minority of Hispanics) to quit voting like their rural counterparts if they want to flip it. Also don't forget about the populous wealthy suburbs in Collin and Denton (college area that Republicans win as well) counties either... Texas won't flip until these places show significant signs of it. As for when it will flip? It'll be over a decade, barring any epic GOP meltdown. After then, it's hard to tell. They have an 8 point gap to make up in an urban county that's a bit whiter than most others... And these are southern whites we're talking about. They aren't swing voters like whites in the north can be.

High end suburban whites weren't a swing demographic in the North either, 50 years ago. Their children were a different story and many of their grandchildren were no longer swing voters, because they had become base Democratic voters (places like Westchester, NY).

The two factors at play, will be how much younger members of this demographic, are less Republican and how high and how democratic the minority vote is. That will determine if or when the states in the sunbelt becomes swing and then Democratic leaning.

The numbers are pretty bad generation gap wise in SC, GA and MS.

I'm not really convinced about MS or especially SC (retiree influx) because I think the black vote will moderate with time, but GA (in 5ish years) and TX (in 10ish years) look quite precarious and LA could even get caught up in this in 15 years or so.  Imagine JBE numbers in the NOLA/Baton Rouge suburbs eventually being the norm in statewide elections.  NC I think will remain no worse than a toss up for Republicans for a long time.  There is enough rural vote left to convert there.  MS is interesting because the rural white vote is already so maxed out, but the state doesn't really have any large cities to drive a Dem trend.

[Skill and Chance]

Insight from a Tarrant County resident. Yes Democrats win the inner city areas here. The problem is, Dems get severely blown out in most suburban areas, which are a larger percentage of Tarrant County than the other urban counties. This is why Dems lose the state quite handily. The suburbs don't allow Dems to take the urban counties by the 70-30 margins they need to win statewide (let alone win Tarrant County). Fort Worth is also home to the stockyard and rodeo scene. Fort Worth and Arlington have Republican mayors. Dems have to figure out how to get suburban whites (and a surprisingly large minority of Hispanics) to quit voting like their rural counterparts if they want to flip it. Also don't forget about the populous wealthy suburbs in Collin and Denton (college area that Republicans win as well) counties either... Texas won't flip until these places show significant signs of it. As for when it will flip? It'll be over a decade, barring any epic GOP meltdown. After then, it's hard to tell. They have an 8 point gap to make up in an urban county that's a bit whiter than most others... And these are southern whites we're talking about. They aren't swing voters like whites in the north can be.

High end suburban whites weren't a swing demographic in the North either, 50 years ago. Their children were a different story and many of their grandchildren were no longer swing voters, because they had become base Democratic voters (places like Westchester, NY).

The two factors at play, will be how much younger members of this demographic, are less Republican and how high and how democratic the minority vote is. That will determine if or when the states in the sunbelt becomes swing and then Democratic leaning.

The numbers are pretty bad generation gap wise in SC, GA and MS.

I'm not really convinced about MS or especially SC (retiree influx) because I think the black vote will moderate with time, but GA (in 5ish years) and TX (in 10ish years) look quite precarious and LA could even get caught up in this in 15 years or so.  Imagine JBE numbers in the NOLA/Baton Rouge suburbs eventually being the norm in statewide elections.  NC I think will remain no worse than a toss up for Republicans for a long time.  There is enough rural vote left to convert there.  MS is interesting because the rural white vote is already so maxed out, but the state doesn't really have any large cities to drive a Dem trend.

The Jackson suburbs are where a lot of the African American youth population growth is concentrated in.

Well, they aren't that big relative to the state, and just like I think 85%+ GOP voting among Southern white people can not last, I also think the 85%+ Dem margins with black voters will slowly fade away.  Consider what happened with the Catholic vote after Kennedy and LBJ.  It went from about 80% Kennedy in a tied national race in 1960 to a swing demographic by the 1980's.

[Skill and Chance]

I actually think Texas Democrats could win the state and still lose Tarrant.  As long as oil prices stay anomalously low, the clearest path to a Dem statewide win in the next 10 years is 65% in Harris + 65% in Dallas + 60% in San Antonio + further erosion of the massive Republican margins in West Texas.  The only thing is that a candidate capable of doing that well in Harris and West Texas might have a turnout problem in the Austin area.