Most vulnerable Southern state for Republicans

[Adam Griffin]

There are several. Probably the most vulnerable is Virginia, followed by a tie for second between Louisiana and Arkansas. The Republican Party takes Georgia seriously for granted, and Tennessee should be nudged out of the red-state status with some serious work.

[Adam Griffin]

I almost had a seizure when I saw the poll results...

... then I checked the posting year.

Virginia is the only objectively correct answer.

If you mean within the timeframe of when this question was first asked. Otherwise, Virginia is now the most vulnerable Southern state for Democrats.

Georgia would be the correct answer - if you go by states that have not been wholly dominated by the GOP in presidential elections for some time. Though not relevant here, NC also had a Dem Gov & state legislature through 2012 and has a Dem Senator, but obviously Republicans have made recent inward roads. The trends, however, point in a different direction at both the state level and for President, so it's one of those states that's truly "vulnerable" for both parties.

Just goes to show you that as recently as 2004, multiple Southern states were thought of as being just as Democrat as they were Republican.  But Southern Strategy!!

As I alluded to above, this discussion should technically be about presidential election trends and not local ones. In 2004, there really weren't any states in the South that could have been thought of as being just as Democratic as they could Republican in that regard. Removing TN in 2000 due to the home state advantage (which Gore still lost by almost 4 points) and FL because it's really not Southern, the closest two states were as big or bigger losses for Gore than Georgia was for Obama in 2008. People thought then that Georgia might be getting closer to becoming a swing state, but nobody would have said the two parties were on par.


Also, heh...

There are several. Probably the most vulnerable is Virginia, followed by a tie for second between Louisiana and Arkansas. The Republican Party takes Georgia seriously for granted, and Tennessee should be nudged out of the red-state status with some serious work.

[Adam Griffin]

Am I the only one seeing the huge of a nuisance that the changing demographics in TX will be for the state GOP very, very soon?

From what I've read and heard, both AR and NC, though still very Democratic at the local level, will be shifting red over the next few years. I guess they are mostly old Dixiecrats whom, by some reason, were too stubborn/lazy/loyal to their tickets to go nominally red. Kind of Zell Millers.

Though I see VA as Southern due to it being in the Confederacy (and hosting its capital also), I don't see it as quite Southern. Northern VA, where if not the majority, very certainly a hefty chunk of the population lives, specially strikes me as very Northeastern.

North Carolina is moving to the left nationally.  Many transplants from the norrtheast in the Charlotte and Research Triangle areas.

Texas is a bit of a possibility, but it is more of a long term potental shift than anything that we will see in the next election cycle or two.

NE transplants, pardon me if I'm wrong, are mostly middle-class Republican leaning fleeing unemployment and high taxes, no? Though very probably more socially liberal than your average Appalachian voter, I thought they were a reliable constituency for the GOP.

It really depends on where these NE transplants are moving. In Georgia, for instance, the Yankees that you see piling up in the mountains and rural parts of NE Georgia are perhaps even more Republican than their Appalachian neighbors, and yes, they're moving there for the reasons you mentioned. Closer to the metro and throughout most of the rest of the state, they tend to be more liberal than the native folk.

And as far as Texas goes: it's fool's gold for the time being. The TXGOP did an excellent job at incorporating Latinos into their party as early as the 1960s, and exit polling continues to show that Republicans there do anywhere from 10-15 points better among Latinos than Republicans do with Latinos in other states. The Latino population of Texas is also better-established, and in many cases, they don't consider themselves "immigrants" anymore. A lot of these folk would classify themselves as "white" by American standards, since they've been Americans for three, four, five or more generations. Then of course, it has to be considered that a decent chunk of the newer, true immigrant populations can't vote because of citizenship status (based on what I've seen from Census data in other parts of the country, I'd say anywhere from 40-55% of first-generation Latinos there are undocumented).

[Adam Griffin]

GA over the past four elections (non-Atlas colors) - with swings between each election annually averaged by county. It helps to understand pop distribution to appreciate it, but the metro is moving fast. Don't let the deepening pockets of red fool you, as those (with the exception of Cherokee, Forsyth and Hall; combined population of ~650k) are mostly relatively unpopulated areas.

Rockdale: 2004 - 60% Bush, 2008 - 54% Obama, 2012 - 58% Obama (36-point swing)
Henry: 2004 - 67% Bush, 2008 - 53% McCain, 2012 - 51% Romney (32-point swing)
Newton: 2004 - 62% Bush, 2008 - 50% Obama, 2012 - 50% Obama (25-point swing)
Gwinnett: 2004 - 66% Bush, 2008 - 55% McCain, 2012 - 54% Romney (24-point swing)
Douglas: 2004 - 61% Bush, 2008 - 50% Obama, 2012 - 51% Obama (20-point swing)
Cobb: 2004 - 62% Bush, 2008 - 54% McCain, 2012 - 55% Romney (14-point swing)

These suburban counties combined are home to around 2 million people.