If West Virginia never seceded from Virginia

[illegaloperation]

What if West Virginia never seceded from Virginia?

[barfbag]

They'd still be red. It would be funny to see how the east and west side of the state would've basically switched. Actually, they probably would be purple throughout the late 20th century.

[PolitiJunkie]

Then this new state would have joined Indiana and North Carolina in flipping D to R from 2008 to 2012.

[illegaloperation]

This would be an interesting state since West Virginia is moving right and Virginia is moving left.

West Virginia became more Republican than Virginia in 2004.

[TDAS04]

It would have been interesting to see if Doug Wilder could have been elected Governor of such a state back in 1989.  Virginia would have been more Democratic than it was, but much whiter.  I wonder how those white West Virginia Democrats would have impacted the outcome of that race with the black Democratic candidate. 

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Charleston is very Democratic, I still think it would have selected Wilder. Then Kerry would have selected Warner and changed the outcome possibly of 2004. New state and Ohio would be contested as bellwethers.