Texas swing

[Sbane]

Southern suburbia is way more evangelical, mega church central. Orange County and the Inland Empire has some of it but southern suburbia is more...pure....

[Sbane]

I think the issue with migration to Texas is that a lot of those people are conservatives to begin with. Or they come to Texas and become more conservative. Florida is really 3 states in one, a southern state up north, a midwestern state in the middle of the state, and a northeastern state in the south. North Carolina had in migration of well educated people to the Raleigh-Durham area and they didn't work in industries which are favorable to the Republicans. In Texas many move to work in the oil industry in Houston or the telecommunications industry in Dallas. Even the software engineers seem conservative out there. Maybe the in migration that is happening in Austin will be different from that. Still, Texas is a mindset and it attracts a lot of conservative people and even those who are in the middle buy into the low tax and low cost living when they move there. Also, liberals will likely avoid moving there, but may not have as much of a problem moving to Atlanta or North Carolina.

[Sbane]

If the vast majority of software engineers are liberals, then Plano and Richardson wouldn't vote like they do. Maybe you are correct about Austin, but certainly not the Dallas area. Also, I do think those who are in the middle are going to be more likely to become Republican in Texas just due to it's reputation. If they like Texas better than their old state, they will likely credit the Republicans for that. That is not the case with Florida, Georgia or North Carolina. I know what you are going to say, but most people aren't political junkies. They don't know how most states vote regularly. They do know Texas votes Republican though, just like they know California and New York vote Democrat.

[Sbane]

Of course they live in Plano and Richardson too! There are plenty of those jobs in the Richardson area, and it's a short commute up to Plano. Irvine has a lot of tech jobs as well, but it's not the software engineers that make the place Democratic leaning. Same goes with Grand Prairie (if in fact a lot of engineers even live there in the first place).