The Other Party's Path to Win Your State

[Orwell]

I guess flood the rural counties....with meth.

Wow, I didn't know this was fair game and that we could use people's drug addictions in such a sadistic way ... I guess your strategy for my state GOP would be to distribute crack all throughout the poor neighborhoods of Chicago?

The National GOP already did this in the 70s and 80s

[lfromnj]

Take the 2018 governor's race and increase Four Points Statewide. I think it could be more uniform Statewide rather than increasing turnout in some areas, but the exceptions would be increasing the numbers in Franklin County, plus picking up in higher education suburbs like Wood County  and Delaware - - - Biden has a decent chance of flipping Delaware County since God knows when. Also continuing to cut margins in the Cincinnati suburb counties like Warren and Butler in particular. By no means flipping them, but cutting into the margin as those are huge votes thanks for the Republicans.

The map actually might look very similar to that race with only Montgomery, Portage, Erie, and wood counties flipping. It would be a skin the teeth level win.

Oh, and Biden needs to recover ground in the traditionally Democratic northeast Ohio border counties like Trumbull, Warren, and Ashtabula. I think you can makeup serious ground there so that those become actual Democratic vote sinks to a smaller degree rather than places that are narrowly won, though Ashtabula still probably won't flip.

DE County last voted blue in 2006 btw for Ted Strickland

[RINO Tom]

I guess flood the rural counties....with meth.

Wow, I didn't know this was fair game and that we could use people's drug addictions in such a sadistic way ... I guess your strategy for my state GOP would be to distribute crack all throughout the poor neighborhoods of Chicago?

Wouldn't work, they'd just take it out to the rural and sell it to them.

The folks in my neighborhood must have missed a shipment or something, because they left a lot behind to be used here!

[Kingpoleon]

Someone like George McGill, who could win over Sebastian, Crawford, Washington, and Benton County.

A fairly decent win is all the eastern counties, plus the Pine Bluff-Little Rock-Hot Springs Area, and then maybe the Texarkana region.

[Former President tack50]

Well, this is quite hard to do in my case. Of course, being in an European country with a multi party system it is already quite hard to get that. However the thing is that my region can be defined as a very quirky region (having a strong nationalit movement) and a "swing state" of sorts, with no real advantage for either side.

You could define the main party as the centre-right nationalist Canarian Coalition, but they were actually ousted from power in 2019. However I think they will have a hard time making a comeback.

Still, I will define them as "the other party", if only because they are in opposition right now. First of all, here is the current composition of the Canarian regional parliament (70 seats, 36 for a majority):

PSOE: 25
CC: 20
PP: 11
NC: 5
UP: 4
ASG: 3
Cs: 2

Current government: PSOE+NC+UP+ASG (37/70)

The electoral system is very badly malapportioned. Each island is used as a constituency, giving between 3 and 15 MPs. There is a separate vote, that gives an extra 9 MPs elected at large.

There are several paths they could take to get back into power:

Option 1: Lure back ASG

The first option involves poaching from the current left of center governing coalition. The main candidate to do this is the ASG, which is a PSOE splitter party existing only in the Island of La Gomera, and led by the local corrupt machine politician there (Casimiro Curbelo), who rules most local institutions with an iron fist.

This was heavily discussed after the 2019 election when ASG ended up as kingmaker. Eventually, ASG sided with the left, leading to the first transfer of power since 1993, but he could have just sided with the right instead. Indeed, he provided some confidence and supply to the last CC government (2015-2019)

Option 2: Grand Coalition

This option basically involves beating PSOE at least in terms of seats, and then making a grand coalition. Bonus points if there is some sort of hung parliament where there are few alternatives (say, an scenario with a right of center coalition dependent on Vox). CC-PSOE coalitions are not unheard of, as the islands were under such a coalition between 2011 and 2016, though CC's "natural" coalition partner is PP

The route to do that would be as follows (from smallest to most populated island):

El Hierro (3 seats): CC 2, PSOE 1
La Gomera (4 seats): PSOE 1
La Palma (8 seats): CC 3, PSOE 2
Fuerteventura (8 seats): PSOE 3, CC 3
Lanzarote (8 seats): PSOE 3, CC 3
Gran Canaria (15 seats): PSOE 5, CC 3
Tenerife (15 seats): CC 6, PSOE 4
Regional (9 seats): PSOE 3, CC 3

Total: CC 23, PSOE 22

Worth noting that with these results PSOE is still probably winning the popular vote; CC tends to be incredibly overrepresented. So they'd need to negotiate very well to get back into power. However, until 2019 they were able to do it.

The hardest parts here are the 2 in the biggest islands, Gran Canaria and Tenerife. Gran Canaria is, and has always been CC's weak spot (and what gave them the PV advantage). Traditionally they only got 1 seat here, and were only able to expand to 2 based of some deals with a local party. Getting 3 would be a huge improvement in unfriendly territory. Similarly, PSOE going down to 4 seats in Tenerife is quite hard as well. Alternatively, PSOE could go down to 2 in Fuerteventura or Lanzarote.

Option 3: A proper right wing majority

The main issue with this one has a clear name: Vox (and Cs). The main issue is that while people can sometimes think of PP or Cs as hardline anti-nationalist parties, they can make deals with parties like CC. CC is nationalist, but it is not secessionist in the slightest. However, they are fiercly pro-autonomy, so a deal with Vox is probably out of the question.

The route here would therefore require for both Vox and Cs to get super small amounts of the vote, as in 2% each, so that neither of them can get seats. After that, you can get a CC-PP coalition, which is a fairly standard right of center coalition here (indeed, CC-PP coalitions or confidence/Supply deals were the standard between 1993 and 2010, when CC broke with PP and went with PSOE)

The required numbers to hit here would be:

El Hierro (3 seats): 2 CC / 1 CC+1PP (current: 1CC, 1 PP)
La Gomera (4 seats): 0 (current: 0)
La Palma (8 seats) : 3 CC + 3 PP (current: 3 CC + 2 PP)
Fuerteventura (8 seats): 3 CC + 1 PP / 2 CC + 2 PP (current: 3 CC + 1 PP)
Lanzarote (8 seats): 3 CC + 2 PP / 4 CC + 1 PP (current: 3 CC +  PP)
Gran Canaria (15 seats): 4 PP + 2 CC (current: 3 PP + 2 CC)
Tenerife: 6 CC + 3 PP (current: 5 CC + 2 PP)
Regional: 3 CC + 2 PP (current: 3 CC + 1 PP)

Total: 37/50

This is probably the scenario most reflective of how a right wing popular vote victory looks like here.

[NewYorkExpress]

New York City would have to secede and form it's own state for Republicans to have any serious chance at winning a statewide election here.

[DINGO Joe]

I guess flood the rural counties....with meth.

Wow, I didn't know this was fair game and that we could use people's drug addictions in such a sadistic way ... I guess your strategy for my state GOP would be to distribute crack all throughout the poor neighborhoods of Chicago?

Wouldn't work, they'd just take it out to the rural and sell it to them.

The folks in my neighborhood must have missed a shipment or something, because they left a lot behind to be used here!

Did you ever read "Methland"? The book about meth is small town Iowa--mainly focusing on Oelwein and Ottumwa.  It's about 10 years old now and probably a little outdated but a great read.  At one time rural areas had more local involvement or even leadership in the drug trade but now it's dominated by larger entities. Mom and Pop lose out to the big city again.

[HillGoose]

I don't think they could ngl lmao

[lfromnj]

New York City would have to secede and form it's own state for Republicans to have any serious chance at winning a statewide election here.

Trump won non NYC NY by 6k votes FWIW.

[Battista Minola 1616]

New York City would have to secede and form it's own state for Republicans to have any serious chance at winning a statewide election here.

Trump won non NYC NY by 6k votes FWIW.

Wrong. He lost New York state outside of New York city by 67k votes.

[morgieb]

Win nationwide

(seriously my state is basically the bellweather for the country as a whole)

As for Premier races, the answer rests in middle-class ethnic suburbia. Whoever wins those likely wins overall.

Which Sydney suburbs would those be (assuming you're from New South Wales)? I know the western Sydney suburbs are stereotypically working-class and MENA.

The ones which was mostly populated by the Chinese rather than the Lebanese or Vietnamese. So places like Hurstville, Strathfield, Burwood, Ryde, Parramatta (which is more Indian than Chinese in fairness). Also Penrith and the Central Coast but those places are very white (and the sort of places that would probably fall in love with Trump).

[Continential]

Since the Election Shuffler exists, people could do this easier.

[Conservatopia]

Okay this may require some knowledge of provincial England to make sense.

Let's set the scene.

My party: Conservatives
Other party: Labour
My state (region): South West England

2019 Election results:
Conservatives 53.8%
Labour 23.4%
Lib Dems 18.2%
Greens 3.8%
Brexit Party 0.8%
Other 1.6%

Con lead: 20.4%

So out of 12 Nations and Regions this is the Tories' third strongest.  To win here Labour would need to be winning in a landslide so big it would dwarf 1997.  It's more likely that the LolDems get second place than Labour winning.

But that would spoil the story so let's have a brief look at how Labour could theoretically win here.

Labour's campaign centerpiece would have to be free scrumpy cider for everyone and they would have to campaign from a horse and cart rather than a battle bus.  In Somerset they promise to reopen the coal mines.
This leads to a surge in the South West but alienates their core demographic elsewhere who prefer craft beer and electric vehicles.
Con lead: 15.6%

Next step they run down the Lib Dem vote as only Labour can.  The LolDems help by looking foolish as usual.  Wera Hobhouse decides not to run for re-election in Bath and Andrew George finally decides to give it rest.  Labour pick up lots of LolDem votes and really run up the score in Bath.
Con lead: 10.4%

The campaign focus then moves to Cornwall where Labour hammer the Tories on fishing quotas and where Boris Johnson is caught on camera saying "Devonwall".  Voters on both sides of the Tamar are shocked at being likened to one another and flock to Labour in outrage.
Con lead: 4.2%

Finally we head far north to Gloucestershire where Labour promise to rename the Severn Bridge to Jenson Button Bridge and reinstate the tolls but for Welsh people only.  Labour plunges in Wales but soars in Glos.  This is enough to get them over the line.

Labour 46.1%
Conservatives 45.4%
Lib Dems 6.2%
Greens 1.1%
Other 1.2%

Now clearly Labour will have lost the election at the national level because they put off so many non-southwesterners but they have the satisfaction of winning the South West of England.

[Хahar 🤔]

I don't really understand why this is in Forum Community, but anyway I'll do California since we know very well how either party can win Georgia. No Republican has won a statewide election in California since 2006, so we'll look at the last three non-gubernatorial elections where Democrats were in danger of losing.



On the left is 2006 Insurance Commissioner (tied for the last time Republicans won statewide), where Steve Poizner defeated Cruz Bustamante by the massive margin of 50.83–38.47. In the middle is 2010 Attorney General, where Kamala Harris defeated Steve Cooley 45.85–45.70. On the right is 2018 Insurance Commissioner, where Ricardo Lara defeated Steve Poizner 52.02–47.98. The former two elections were held prior to the introduction of jungle primaries.

What stands out in the last map, of course, is that it doesn't have a Republican candidate, since Steve Poizner abandoned his party affiliation prior to the 2018 election. It's clear that Republican Party affiliation is toxic in California now, and so it is much easier for a Republican to win than it is for the Republican Party to do so. For this reason the Sacramento County DA recently changed her party affiliation from Republican to "decline to state" in preparation for her bid for attorney general next year.

An unpopular Democrat obviously helps, although Poizner almost won in 2018 anyway. In 2006, Bustamante faced no serious primary opposition but was nonetheless abandoned by Democratic voters for his perceived betrayal of Gray Davis. In 2010, Harris was seen as too left-wing for swing voters and faced a credible Republican opponent in the Los Angeles County DA. It's not hard to imagine Democrats running a bad candidate in the future; the way that candidate selection these days works in the California Democratic Party does not have much to do with popularity or electability. As an example, while Democrats were probably going to win the gubernatorial election in 2010 no matter what due to Arnold Schwarzenegger's unpopularity, Gavin Newsom would likely have had a rough time had he been the nominee.

The path to victory is actually pretty simple: run up the margins in suburban Southern California, keep things reasonably close in suburban Northern California. It makes sense that the two offices for which this has been possible have been insurance commissioner and attorney general, because those are offices for which a Republican can make the case that their expertise (in either business or criminal justice) is more important than the positions of the national party on unrelated issues. Most likely the candidate would have to be either a self-funder perceived as credible due to business expertise or a politician not involved in federal or state politics (that is to say, a mayor or a district attorney). As mentioned previously, it obviously helps if this candidate is not openly Republican.

All that being said, the other path is for Democrats to be locked out of a top-two election. This is obviously very difficult since the Democratic electorate is so much larger than the Republican electorate, but it almost happened in the 2014 election for controller; if 28,086 votes for Republican Ashley Swearengin had instead been cast for fellow Republican David Evans, those two would have advanced to the general election. It seems that Democrats have since learned their lesson and have been much more hesitant to allow multiple serious candidates to contest a primary, which has not been to the benefit of democracy in California.

[Ancestral Republican]

Angry cops and firefighters in Long Island flip the state R, with very good R candidates like Vito Fossella.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Have a living candidate who hasn't done anything about the Confederate flag.

[Cokeland Saxton]

Be 2008 Obama