Romney obviously won't win New Jersey, but he would certainly play better there than most. It's a pretty tolerant state, too -- I doubt his Mormonism would be much of an issue there.
So from what I'm getting from all this talk is that the suburban population of New Jersey is still largely Republican. Especially, in the southern part of the sate along the shore areas.
However many areas of the state have shifted hard D due to demographic and geographical changes?
There have been few "hard D" shifts in the state, but there have been a handful of "soft D" shifts. Primarily:
- Bergen County, once a GOP stronghold, shifted towards Democrats hard in the 2000s. It's moved back to the GOP a little, but that is mostly a corrective move and based on Democratic corruption in the county. On the whole, it's likely to keep trending Democratic at a steady pace.
- Somerset County has always been a Republican stronghold, but Democrats are moving the needle there. It's a natural progression -- there's less and less farmland, more suburbia. These towns aren't getting less wealthy, but they are getting more ethnically diverse. It remains Republican, but it's moderate Republican (favoring the Lance/Zimmer type over the Ferguson/Pappas type). Movement in Somerset County is one of the main reasons why Ferguson almost lost.
- Essex County has been incredibly polarized throughout its history -- a firmly Democratic urban core in Newark; a rich Republican set of outer suburbs. These once-Republican towns are undergoing a transformation -- more transplants from New York City are moving in seeking a "quieter" life. A key barometer here: Democrats won the freeholder district carved out specifically for Republicans in 2005.
- Republicans enjoyed much success in Mercer County in the 1980s; the 1991 ultra-Republican blip gave the GOP a legislative foothold in the county that lasted two decades. Democrats have since recaptured just about everything outside local government in Hamilton Township, the county's largest and most competitive municipality. In 1993, Whitman won Mercer by 6%; Christie lost it by 15% in 2009. It's the only county where Corzine improved his margins over time.
I kind of disagree on Somerset. It's not moderate Republican, it just happens to have some very Democratic areas in it (North Plainfield, Somerset CDP/Franklin Twp). The Republicans are no more moderate than those in Morris, there are just more minorities.
The change in the Democrats' favor mostly stems from the growth of Franklin Twp relative to the rest of the county (22% growth in Franklin Twp 2000-2010 v. 8% county-wide), and the increasing minority population there.
