How is Pennsylvania trending R?

[AGA]

The rural areas are losing population while the Philadelphia suburbs are growing.

[Obama-Biden Democrat]

The Philly area is not booming like Atlanta, Houston, DFW, or Austin. It is not shrinking like rural PA, but it is growing slowly.

[Roll Roons]

Plus areas like Lackawanna, Luzerne, SWPA and the Lehigh Valley have been trending R in the Trump era. If Republicans manage to hold those gains and not lose too much more ground in the Philly suburbs, it could very well be a Lean R state by 2032. But for 2020, it's probably Tilt D.

[Starry Eyed Jagaloon]

I wrote about it here: https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=312014.msg6639015#msg6639015

TL;DR
Appalachia and NEPA trending R has produced net votes for the GOP even as they shrink and Philly grows and and trends D. This is unlikely to be sustainable going forward, because these regions will make up an ever-smaller portion of the state even if they continue to move right.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Yes, the state has trended right but Hilary was a flawed candidate and 3 percent went to Gary Johnson and Mike Bloomberg levied millions to get Toomey reelected on gun control

[Nyvin]

2016 was kind of a perfect timing opportunity for Republicans,  with the Scranton area trending R along with the western part of the state trending R both just enough to overcome the Philly D trend.

I don't see it being a long term thing considering nearly every growing part of the state is trending D.   At some point or another Republicans will need to find new voters somewhere.

We'll see if their current strategy works in 2020, but after that I'm pretty sure it'll be done.

[Orser67]

If we're talking about Pennsylvania trending R, then we're pretty much talking about the trend between 2012 and 2016, because Democrats did quite well in PA in 2018.

The median PA county gave Obama 41% of the vote in 2012, compared to 33% for Clinton in 2016. Now obviously, counties don't vote, but I think that figure gives a good idea of what happened to Democratic support outside of the most populous counties: it absolutely collapsed. Counties that Obama had won >40% in, Clinton won >30%, and counties that Obama won >30%, Clinton won >20% in. Even Obama's worst county, Fulton County, went from 78R-21D in 2012 to 84R-13D in 2016. Outside of SEPA, Democrats also lost ground in several counties that Obama had won >50% in, such as Lackawanna (home of Scranton) and Erie.

Democrats lost ground in every metropolitan statistical area except for Greater Philadelphia (Clinton lost a little ground in the city itself, but more than made up for that with gains in the suburbs, primarily in Chester and Montgomery counties) and State College (home of Penn State). Gains in Greater Philly were basically canceled out by Trump's gains in the Greater Pittsburgh MSA, as Greater Pittsburgh+Greater Philly combined went from 59D-40R in 2012 to 58D-39R in 2016. Meanwhile, the smaller metros went from 52R-47D to 55R-40D and the more rural areas outside of the MSAs went from 61R-37D to 68R-28D.

So TLDR: Clinton did pretty well in Greater Philadelphia, but saw her support collapse basically everywhere else.

[SInNYC]

Because PA's second major metro area is Pittsburgh, and Pitt was blue but in a blue collar union sense, which is the demographic Hillary repelled. Union voters were one of the biggest R-trending demographics in 2016, and the national party's actions since then dont seem to have helped much. Biden may have a personal connection with them, but the long term future isnt bright if the party continues on its 'lets lose a blue collar rube and gain 3 educated suburban voters' kick.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

If we're talking about Pennsylvania trending R, then we're pretty much talking about the trend between 2012 and 2016, because Democrats did quite well in PA in 2018.

This is like the difference between weather and climate. I seriously recommend people who study politics also study natural science, it makes it so much easier to frame these discussions. This is a good place for the climate versus weather analogy. You have swings back and forth based on cyclical nature of politics (weather) and then you have the long term shifts, which affects the range of those swings (Climate).

If you want to compare 2018 to something, compare it to the last Dem leaning midterm in a GOP Presidency.





This is Bob Casey Jr's first and third election maps, both were midterm elections that were very good for Democrats. There is no one better than Bob Casey in terms of winning or minimizing the damage out-state and even he has not been immune to what has happened, it has just been not quite as bad for him if that makes sense.

At best Casey has pulled off a "rear guard" action in those areas, and relied on the suburbs to propel his victories in 2012 and 2018.

[RINO Tom]

First off, people should at least be aware of the (2016) population breakdown of the state:

NW Pennsylvania: 657,891 (5.15%)
SW Pennsylvania: 2,628,215 (20.56%)
- Greater Pittsburgh: 2,342,299
- Other SW PA: 258,916
Central Pennsylvania: 2,502,264 (19.57%)
NE Pennsylvania: 1,142,531 (8.94%)
SE Pennsylvania: 5,853,626 (45.79%)
- Philly Metro: 4,095,710
- Other SE PA: 1,757,616

So, the area of the state that has trended GOP the fastest has ~20% of the state's population, and the area that has trended Democratic the fastest has ~45.79% of the state's population.  You could probably even subtract and add a percentage point, respectively, by now.  That tells me that people are focusing far too much on counties flipping and not enough on the margins.  In other words, the GOP decline in the suburbs has actually been mild enough to not sink them ... if they were losing the Philadelphia suburbs by as much as people are acting like, they couldn't win the state; there just aren't enough rural voters to begin with, and the share declines each year.  Don't get me wrong, Trump lost every suburban Philly county, but he kept the margin a LOT better than Democrats got elsewhere in the state.

My points are that 1) people underestimate the number of Republican voters in major metro areas of every single state, which actually give them the numbers to win statewide (i.e., there aren't that many rural voters, and people should stop acting like they comprise a majority of Republican voters ... it's just math) and 2) there is, in fact, a lot of room for Trump to fall further with the exact same map in 2020, which I expect to happen.

[Obama-Biden Democrat]

In 2004, PA was D+5, in 2008 it was D+4,in 2012 it was D+1 and in 2016 it was it was R+3. Kerry lost the national PV in 2004 by 2.5% and won PA by 2.5%, in 2020 Hillary won the national PV by 2 while losing PA by under 1 point. PA has gone from D+5 to R+3 in 16 years.

[brucejoel99]

Despite shrinking, virtually all rural areas in PA have become Republican strongholds while the suburban & urban areas of the state, though indeed trending Democratic, didn't do so at a fast enough rate - at least, for 2016 - to offset the GOP's rural strength.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The rural areas are losing population while the Philadelphia suburbs are growing.

Rural areas are trending hard Republican and Democrats used to rely on certain levels of support. You go back far enough and Fulton County was a Democratic county, while Philly was the Republican base. Anyway, as labor politics gives way to culture identity politics you have various areas of the state shift from Democratic to Republican.

You have Philly, which all you of you seem to focus on ad nauseum and presume that this going to make the state vote like New York.

You have a completely different metro of significant size that is Midwestern in culture, whose suburbs (until 2018) remained solidly Republican and whose outlying rural areas were heavily Democratic or at least could still be won by Dems like Bob Casey. That rural stupport and small town support has imploded over the last ten years.

That poster presently going by the name Cory Booker is going on about gun control and millions from Bloomberg. Philly metro is pro-gun control, but guess who isn't? Casey Democrats

Philly Metro is historically pro-choice, but guess who isn't. Casey Democrats

Philly Metro is more pro-enviroment, guess who isn't. Casey Democrats - which is coal country and now the fracking belt in Northern PA.

Philly is pro-immigration (It should be noted for all of the talk about gun control, Toomey also used sanctuary cities as a wedge issue to get those Philly suburbanites you guys love so much to vote like the crime/minority conscious white people that they are), but Casey Democrats are not (Casey Jr. himself is, which is partly why his numbers have gone down). Jason Altmire had an A or B rating from NumbersUSA. So did Paul Kanjorski. So did Chris Carney. So did Tim Holden (that is Berks and Schuylkill just outside the SE PA line). Casey has an F while we are on the subject, but identity and legacy attachment is hard thing to destroy completely (Though it is getting there see the maps above. Its just like the Kennedy's in a sense).

I am tempted to say Philly is pro- free trade but I cannot even be sure of that. I do know that Pennsylvania is a post-industrial state that suffers from I term "rust-best nostalgia" this means that they are very much sympathetic to protectionism. I know what this is, I was born in Susquehanna, I have been to Wilkes-Barre and Scranton, have been inside a coal mine and seen the rotting hulks of abandoned industry. Its an aching in the soul that you just cannot understand unless you have been there and lived it. Even beyond that, PA has long been a protectionist hot bed. From 1846 until 2016, it has more often than not responded positively to protectionist or quasi protectionist candidates. Republicans built their majority on protectionism from Lincoln to Hoover (Hoover won it in 1932 after Smoot-Hawley). Reagan had quotas, Santorum opposed NAFTA. And of course Dems like Holden, like Casey and so on have been critical of bad trade deals.

You have 5 counties (Philly, Montco, Delco, Bucks, Chester) that you guys fixate on because their size and growth and then ignore that the rest of the state is culturally on a completely different planet. You guys also forget that SE PA can be cracked on crime issues (a combination of background checks and anti-sanctuary cities) is what Toomey used. Trump just said Crime and immigration repeatedly and though he didn't win any of those counties, he came really close in Bucks.

Biden has identity helping him out, but he is at odds with out state PA on abortion, guns, energy, immigration and trade. Yes you might be able to make a case on a point or two about trade, but at the end of the day it is the package that presents to that part of a state a candidate that is at odds with them.

The question is not really in terms of results. Biden is not going to win those counties for the most part, if Casey couldn't win them, Biden isn't. Biden also isn't going to get to Casey's numbers either. That makes sense, Casey won by 13% and if the nation really is plus 8, then that difference explains how PA ends up being only an 8 or 9 point Biden win. Then beyond that it becomes question of better than Clinton, worse than Clinton, or same as Clinton. Biden can win PA in all three scenarios though the margin is substantially affected and the exact final numbers in Philly become important in that.

At the same time, Trump can win PA again but there are certain things he has to be able to do and holding his support/improving in those areas where he did well in 2016 is first priority. After that, he needs to shore up the support in the Pittsburgh suburbs.

The thing that needs to be emphasized is that PA is the epicenter of a cultural divide in this country and to quote John King it is where the hand to hand combat between the two coalitions takes place. I fully expect PA to remain closely divided for several cycles and to be the decisive state in a few of them.

[Dr Oz Lost Party!]

I wrote about it here: https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=312014.msg6639015#msg6639015

TL;DR
Appalachia and NEPA trending R has produced net votes for the GOP even as they shrink and Philly grows and and trends D. This is unlikely to be sustainable going forward, because these regions will make up an ever-smaller portion of the state even if they continue to move right.

Pretty much this. The population trend in the long-term favors the Democrats.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

I neglected the fact that Ohio is turning R and PA and MI and WI are turning Dem. I was going  by instinct instead of intellect, but PA is turning D while OH is turning R as coal miners see the threat to their lively hood is being taken over by technology

[TML]

I neglected the fact that Ohio is turning R and PA and MI and WI are turning Dem. I was going  by instinct instead of intellect, but PA is turning D while OH is turning R as coal miners see the threat to their lively hood is being taken over by technology

I don't think that's the main reason OH is moving in the R direction, since the coal-producing regions of OH have fewer people than the fast-growing Columbus metropolitan area (which is trending D). Instead, what's driving Republican dominance is their gains in northeastern and north-central OH, which is part of the Rust Belt region in general, and they were strongly attracted to Trump's anti-trade rhetoric (Brown won this region in 2018 by virtue of emphasizing his pro-worker positions during his campaign).

[Orser67]

If we're talking about Pennsylvania trending R, then we're pretty much talking about the trend between 2012 and 2016, because Democrats did quite well in PA in 2018.

This is like the difference between weather and climate.

This is in and of itself is a fair point. But, while comparing Casey's map in 2006 to his map in 2018 might be useful in terms of seeing how his support within the state has shifted, the fact that he won a landslide election by a slightly smaller margin seems like, at best, an extremely weak piece of evidence that PA is trending right. There are just so many other factors at play (candidate quality, increasing polarization, state-to-state/regional variation) that I don't see how once can really say that Casey winning by "just" 13 points as opposed to 17 points is evidence of a rightward trend. Especially when Wolf also won a landslide re-election.

In 2004, PA was D+5, in 2008 it was D+4,in 2012 it was D+1 and in 2016 it was it was R+3. Kerry lost the national PV in 2004 by 2.5% and won PA by 2.5%, in 2020 Hillary won the national PV by 2 while losing PA by under 1 point. PA has gone from D+5 to R+3 in 16 years.

This, on the other hand, is a good point.

[clever but short]

First off, people should at least be aware of the (2016) population breakdown of the state:

NW Pennsylvania: 657,891 (5.15%)
SW Pennsylvania: 2,628,215 (20.56%)
- Greater Pittsburgh: 2,342,299
- Other SW PA: 258,916
Central Pennsylvania: 2,502,264 (19.57%)
NE Pennsylvania: 1,142,531 (8.94%)
SE Pennsylvania: 5,853,626 (45.79%)
- Philly Metro: 4,095,710
- Other SE PA: 1,757,616

So, the area of the state that has trended GOP the fastest has ~20% of the state's population, and the area that has trended Democratic the fastest has ~45.79% of the state's population.  You could probably even subtract and add a percentage point, respectively, by now.  That tells me that people are focusing far too much on counties flipping and not enough on the margins.  In other words, the GOP decline in the suburbs has actually been mild enough to not sink them ... if they were losing the Philadelphia suburbs by as much as people are acting like, they couldn't win the state; there just aren't enough rural voters to begin with, and the share declines each year.  Don't get me wrong, Trump lost every suburban Philly county, but he kept the margin a LOT better than Democrats got elsewhere in the state.

My points are that 1) people underestimate the number of Republican voters in major metro areas of every single state, which actually give them the numbers to win statewide (i.e., there aren't that many rural voters, and people should stop acting like they comprise a majority of Republican voters ... it's just math) and 2) there is, in fact, a lot of room for Trump to fall further with the exact same map in 2020, which I expect to happen.

[Flyersfan232]

The Philly area is not booming like Atlanta, Houston, DFW, or Austin. It is not shrinking like rural PA, but it is growing slowly.

It’s not growing either philly is a dead city

[Flyersfan232]

The rural areas are losing population while the Philadelphia suburbs are growing.

Rural areas are trending hard Republican and Democrats used to rely on certain levels of support. You go back far enough and Fulton County was a Democratic county, while Philly was the Republican base. Anyway, as labor politics gives way to culture identity politics you have various areas of the state shift from Democratic to Republican.

You have Philly, which all you of you seem to focus on ad nauseum and presume that this going to make the state vote like New York.

You have a completely different metro of significant size that is Midwestern in culture, whose suburbs (until 2018) remained solidly Republican and whose outlying rural areas were heavily Democratic or at least could still be won by Dems like Bob Casey. That rural stupport and small town support has imploded over the last ten years.

That poster presently going by the name Cory Booker is going on about gun control and millions from Bloomberg. Philly metro is pro-gun control, but guess who isn't? Casey Democrats

Philly Metro is historically pro-choice, but guess who isn't. Casey Democrats

Philly Metro is more pro-enviroment, guess who isn't. Casey Democrats - which is coal country and now the fracking belt in Northern PA.

Philly is pro-immigration (It should be noted for all of the talk about gun control, Toomey also used sanctuary cities as a wedge issue to get those Philly suburbanites you guys love so much to vote like the crime/minority conscious white people that they are), but Casey Democrats are not (Casey Jr. himself is, which is partly why his numbers have gone down). Jason Altmire had an A or B rating from NumbersUSA. So did Paul Kanjorski. So did Chris Carney. So did Tim Holden (that is Berks and Schuylkill just outside the SE PA line). Casey has an F while we are on the subject, but identity and legacy attachment is hard thing to destroy completely (Though it is getting there see the maps above. Its just like the Kennedy's in a sense).

I am tempted to say Philly is pro- free trade but I cannot even be sure of that. I do know that Pennsylvania is a post-industrial state that suffers from I term "rust-best nostalgia" this means that they are very much sympathetic to protectionism. I know what this is, I was born in Susquehanna, I have been to Wilkes-Barre and Scranton, have been inside a coal mine and seen the rotting hulks of abandoned industry. Its an aching in the soul that you just cannot understand unless you have been there and lived it. Even beyond that, PA has long been a protectionist hot bed. From 1846 until 2016, it has more often than not responded positively to protectionist or quasi protectionist candidates. Republicans built their majority on protectionism from Lincoln to Hoover (Hoover won it in 1932 after Smoot-Hawley). Reagan had quotas, Santorum opposed NAFTA. And of course Dems like Holden, like Casey and so on have been critical of bad trade deals.

You have 5 counties (Philly, Montco, Delco, Bucks, Chester) that you guys fixate on because their size and growth and then ignore that the rest of the state is culturally on a completely different planet. You guys also forget that SE PA can be cracked on crime issues (a combination of background checks and anti-sanctuary cities) is what Toomey used. Trump just said Crime and immigration repeatedly and though he didn't win any of those counties, he came really close in Bucks.

Biden has identity helping him out, but he is at odds with out state PA on abortion, guns, energy, immigration and trade. Yes you might be able to make a case on a point or two about trade, but at the end of the day it is the package that presents to that part of a state a candidate that is at odds with them.

The question is not really in terms of results. Biden is not going to win those counties for the most part, if Casey couldn't win them, Biden isn't. Biden also isn't going to get to Casey's numbers either. That makes sense, Casey won by 13% and if the nation really is plus 8, then that difference explains how PA ends up being only an 8 or 9 point Biden win. Then beyond that it becomes question of better than Clinton, worse than Clinton, or same as Clinton. Biden can win PA in all three scenarios though the margin is substantially affected and the exact final numbers in Philly become important in that.

At the same time, Trump can win PA again but there are certain things he has to be able to do and holding his support/improving in those areas where he did well in 2016 is first priority. After that, he needs to shore up the support in the Pittsburgh suburbs.

The thing that needs to be emphasized is that PA is the epicenter of a cultural divide in this country and to quote John King it is where the hand to hand combat between the two coalitions takes place. I fully expect PA to remain closely divided for several cycles and to be the decisive state in a few of them.

If only Casey was a Casey democrat

[Non Swing Voter]

I agree with the comments above.  It trending in 2016 but not after that.  The philly area has trended sharply to Democrats.  On the flip side the Philly area is growing much slower than other big city metros so the impact will be less pronounces.

I also think you could consider 2016 somewhat of a fluke because that's not a heavily early voting state so the Comey thing had a serious impact on the vote there.  I remember being very worried on Election Day too because there was some issue with the metro or buses or something in Philly.  Like a union strike or something.  Then turnout appeared to be down.

[lfromnj]

Ok where has this myth the philly area swung sharply to Democrats come from?
Philly the city moved a decent bit right(some of it black turnout but also a lot of Trumpy areas)(trump got more votes than romney here
Buck was stagnant
Deleware moved a bit to the left.
Only Chester and montgomery actually moved sharply left.

[zoz]

If only Casey was a Casey democrat

[Non Swing Voter]

Ok where has this myth the philly area swung sharply to Democrats come from?
Philly the city moved a decent bit right(some of it black turnout but also a lot of Trumpy areas)(trump got more votes than romney here
Buck was stagnant
Deleware moved a bit to the left.
Only Chester and montgomery actually moved sharply left.

how is 3 out of 4 big suburbs moving left not an obvious trend?  They also cleaned house in the 2018 congressional elections, albeit somewhat helped by redistricting.

[Obama-Biden Democrat]

Ok where has this myth the philly area swung sharply to Democrats come from?
Philly the city moved a decent bit right(some of it black turnout but also a lot of Trumpy areas)(trump got more votes than romney here
Buck was stagnant
Deleware moved a bit to the left.
Only Chester and montgomery actually moved sharply left.

Yea, Democrats in 2016 were expecting that there would be manageable losses in western and rural PA, but that would be more than made up with a D landslide in the Philly suburbs. That happened in 2018, but not 2016. There was a D trend in the Philly suburbs in 2016, but not a giant landslide like was expected.