Illinois = future purple state?

[jamestroll]

You can make better arguments for Rhode Island, Oregon, maybe Connecticut (not happening) becoming GOP states but you rarely see them. It is also a terrible narrative that the GOP will have to adapt to win Illinois because of losing Texas. 44 electoral votes will not be made up by 17 in the 2030 (but that is getting a little far out to predict).

The only reason why this is a discussion is because of the states geographic location.

Fun fact: Cook County makes up a larger share of Illinois than Nova does of Virginia and yet people think Nova casts the majority of Virginia's votes.

Other fun facts: Clinton's total vote share was higher in Illinois than Oregon, Washington, New Jersey, Connecticut and Delaware. There are not tons of threads and discussion about any of those states  becoming GOP states.

Though it is valid point that we may want to see if there is actually a big city exodus if the covid19 pandemic continues and we are unable to find a vaccine. If that is the case political voting patterns in many states could be dramatically impacted and county maps may become completely foreign to them. Transplants can change county voting patterns.

To be fair, Virginia also has Richmond and Norfolk. IL doesn't.

Yes but we have nearly 2/3 of Illinois trending Dem and 1/3 trending GOP. Guess who wins out?

Also Nova alone is not the reason the states politics changed. Its 30% of the state. The Richmond trend is an underrated reason.

[lfromnj]

You can make better arguments for Rhode Island, Oregon, maybe Connecticut (not happening) becoming GOP states but you rarely see them. It is also a terrible narrative that the GOP will have to adapt to win Illinois because of losing Texas. 44 electoral votes will not be made up by 17 in the 2030 (but that is getting a little far out to predict).

The only reason why this is a discussion is because of the states geographic location.

Fun fact: Cook County makes up a larger share of Illinois than Nova does of Virginia and yet people think Nova casts the majority of Virginia's votes.

Other fun facts: Clinton's total vote share was higher in Illinois than Oregon, Washington, New Jersey, Connecticut and Delaware. There are not tons of threads and discussion about any of those states  becoming GOP states.

Though it is valid point that we may want to see if there is actually a big city exodus if the covid19 pandemic continues and we are unable to find a vaccine. If that is the case political voting patterns in many states could be dramatically impacted and county maps may become completely foreign to them. Transplants can change county voting patterns.

To be fair, Virginia also has Richmond and Norfolk. IL doesn't.

Yes but we have nearly 2/3 of Illinois trending Dem and 1/3 trending GOP. Guess who wins out?

Also Nova alone is not the reason the states politics changed. Its 30% of the state. The Richmond trend is an underrated reason.

Did I mention the blue islands?

Essentially enough transplants brought their liberal politics to the cities and changed it. Very similar to how southern states were turned red in the 1950s and 1960s. NoVA/Richmond/Hampton Roads all got more Democratic metro areas as a result, and when combined with the depopulation of SWVA/Southside/Shenandoah, that can really affect things, when the median voter is a suburban person in Leesburg rather than a rural conservative as it was 10 years ago.

NOVA and Richmond have strongly trended Democrat although the Hampton roads has more or less just lightly trended Democrat from 08 to 16 due to the relative inelasticity of the area and the much lower college education ranking and also the educated part(the historic triangle trending very Democrat).Also the normalized black turnout in 2016 caused that.
 I think the Hampton roads will stay relatively constant with the larger cities like Chesapeake and VA beach being around the same, the inner black cities are also depopulating like Portsmouth and Newport News and Hampton Depopulating while Ds will make gains in the historic triangle of Williamsburg,Yorktown and Jamestown which all have a 40%+ 25+ bachelor rate.

However I would like to mention the "blue islands" in Virginia
Starting from the SW in radford city, then montgomery county, then Roanake,then Lynchburg,then charlottesville/albemarle and finally Waynesboro, Staunton and Harrisonburg these areas form a relatively isolated group of Democrats from other blue regions but have 500k that were Obama +14.7 but Clinton +15.2 despite being outside the Urban crescent. These form a large group of mostly college towns besides Roanake that have helped slow the margins in what is the Shenandoah and Appalachia. Considering thats almost like like 7% of Virginia as a whole its hard to exclude this group.

[Gracile]

Aside from Chicagoland, IL also has the smaller metros of Champaign and McLean counties, which have also trended Democratic and grew in their share of the state's population.

[jamestroll]

Posted without comment

https://twitter.com/PoliticalKiwi/status/1260910070902054913

[nclib]

That's because Trump had less room for improvement among white Southerners since Romney did so well with them.

[jamestroll]

That's because Trump had less room for improvement among white Southerners since Romney did so well with them.

That is 100% correct. 100% Correct. But notice how there is one certain state in the Midwest that bucked the trend?

[Senator-elect Spark]

Yes. If you take a look at my future trends video, I have IL becoming more competitive by 2040. Chicago will lose population and R's will become way more moderate to have a fighting chance.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

I suspect people subconsciously want Illinois to be a purple state for the same reason they want SC to be a purple state, but 'full Democrat east coast sweep' and 'full Republican midwestern sweep' simply aren't happening in this political generation.

[jamestroll]

Yes. If you take a look at my future trends video, I have IL becoming more competitive by 2040. Chicago will lose population and R's will become way more moderate to have a fighting chance.

Ah yes because 2016 and 2018 trends are forever ironclad. (They are not really) And no Covid-19 will not necessarily depopulate cities. It may make the collar counties larger in population but they are trending Democratic as well. Despite Covid-19, urbanism has many advantages that will continue post-pandemic.

It is next to impossible to predict elections past like 2022 really.

I don't see countless people here arguing Washington, Oregon, Connecticut, Rhode Island, etc will become GOP states.

I suspect people subconsciously want Illinois to be a purple state for the same reason they want SC to be a purple state, but 'full Democrat east coast sweep' and 'full Republican midwestern sweep' simply aren't happening in this political generation.

Irony is that the GOP has to break out of Trumpism and his coalition to be competitive in Illinois again.

[Sestak]

every state is a future purple state if you wait long enough

[King of Kensington]

The idea of #eastcoast SC voting to the left of #midwestern IL is pretty laughable.

[King of Kensington]

Re: white vote swings map, Trump had an appeal to the rust belt WWC and Italian Americans in the Northeast.*  The WWC wasn't enough of a factor to counter the Democratic trend in Chicago's suburbs.

* This likely explains Trump's stronger performance in the suburbs of NYC compared to the Chicago suburbs. 

[Figueira]

Posted without comment

https://twitter.com/PoliticalKiwi/status/1260910070902054913

There wasn't much room for him to improve among white Southerners.

[King of Kensington]

Seems like a good explanation to me.  Also didn't realize the Chicago Tribune hadn't endorsed a GOP presidential candidate since 2004.

https://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/August-2018/Why-Its-So-Hard-for-Republicans-to-Win-in-Illinois/