Why Did Latah County, ID swing R?

[perpetual_cynic]

Latah County is a college County. Most college counties swung D, why did Latah swing R?

[TML]

This county is located in a state where a third party candidate (namely Evan McMullin) received a significant share of the vote in 2016, and most of those voters switched to Trump in 2020 without McMullin himself on the ballot.

[If my soul was made of stone]

College students learning remotely surely didn't favor the Democrats, either, as with other college counties in deeply Republican regions (Jackson, IL, and Athens, OH, come to mind)

[Tekken_Guy]

This county is located in a state where a third party candidate (namely Evan McMullin) received a significant share of the vote in 2016, and most of those voters switched to Trump in 2020 without McMullin himself on the ballot.

Not really. McMullin didn’t do well in Western Idaho, his strength was in the east.

[perpetual_cynic]

College students learning remotely surely didn't favor the Democrats, either, as with other college counties in deeply Republican regions (Jackson, IL, and Athens, OH, come to mind)

I calculated the Precinct results and it shows the city of Moscow swung to the left hard. The rural areas swung hard right. This is also the same story in Athens, OH.

[Hope For A New Era]

College students learning remotely surely didn't favor the Democrats, either, as with other college counties in deeply Republican regions (Jackson, IL, and Athens, OH, come to mind)

I calculated the Precinct results and it shows the city of Moscow swung to the left hard. The rural areas swung hard right. This is also the same story in Athens, OH.

can you check Crawford County KS

[perpetual_cynic]

College students learning remotely surely didn't favor the Democrats, either, as with other college counties in deeply Republican regions (Jackson, IL, and Athens, OH, come to mind)

I calculated the Precinct results and it shows the city of Moscow swung to the left hard. The rural areas swung hard right. This is also the same story in Athens, OH.

can you check Crawford County KS

Do you mean to see how the city of Pittsburg swung?

[Hope For A New Era]

College students learning remotely surely didn't favor the Democrats, either, as with other college counties in deeply Republican regions (Jackson, IL, and Athens, OH, come to mind)

I calculated the Precinct results and it shows the city of Moscow swung to the left hard. The rural areas swung hard right. This is also the same story in Athens, OH.

can you check Crawford County KS

Do you mean to see how the city of Pittsburg swung?

Yes. The county had a big swing to the right, which I imagine is partly because of students staying home.

[perpetual_cynic]

College students learning remotely surely didn't favor the Democrats, either, as with other college counties in deeply Republican regions (Jackson, IL, and Athens, OH, come to mind)

I calculated the Precinct results and it shows the city of Moscow swung to the left hard. The rural areas swung hard right. This is also the same story in Athens, OH.

can you check Crawford County KS

Do you mean to see how the city of Pittsburg swung?

Yes. The county had a big swing to the right, which I imagine is partly because of students staying home.

The city of Pittsburg voted 51-40% Trump in 2016 and 52-45% Trump in 2020. The City of Pittsburg swung 4% to the left.

[bayareabay]

Idaho doesn't have liberal or prestigious universities like Berkeley, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Stanford, etc.

[Adam Griffin]

If you want a mathematical/simple answer, then here it is: there was a huge turnout variance between "Democratic/urban" and "Republican/rural" precincts between 2016 and 2020.

In 2016, the precincts Clinton won comprised 67.9% of the total vote in Latah County. In 2020, those same precincts only comprised 63.4% of the county's vote (with Trump flipping 4/18 precincts that Clinton won; all on the outskirts of Moscow). Still, all in all, the 3P voters in '16 in Latah County that broke for one of the two major candidates in '20 backed Biden (somewhere between 55-60%).

In the Clinton-16 precincts, Biden actually saw a greater swing (5.0 points to Biden) than Trump did in his 2016 precincts (3.7 points to Trump), but the latter shifting from 32% of the vote to 37% of the vote was enough to generate a 0.8 point swing to Trump overall.

College students learning remotely surely didn't favor the Democrats, either, as with other college counties in deeply Republican regions (Jackson, IL, and Athens, OH, come to mind)

Bingo (though as others mentioned prior, it doesn't show in the percentages: only the raw turnout).