Magna, UT (and the western suburbs of SLC)

[Sol]

This was going to be a thread on why Magna, Utah has the voting patterns it does, but it seems partly answered by my research. Figured I'd post it anyway since it's interesting and I haven't seen it discussed before, but would love to hear corrections and additions from SLC knowers.

Magna, Utah is a small suburb of Salt Lake City. It's generally pretty Republican, but it's swingish for Democrats in good circumstances. However, the pattern of when it's gone Democratic is pretty interesting--it very narrowly voted for Obama in '08, but in 2020 despite broad improvements in adjacent areas it voted for Trump by a modest margin.

In looking into it, it appears that it was an industrial town, heavily settled by copper mining European immigrants from Carbon County working in the Oquirrh Mountains (skewing thus non-Mormon). When you combine that with the fact that the western suburbs are less Mormon, more Latino, and more working class, it starts to make sense in the context of other swings elsewhere in the state and country. You see a similar pattern to Magna in Copperton, which was straight up a mining town.

I very curious how the places like Magna and Copperton, and the western suburbs of SLC more generally, are going to move politically going forward. On the one hand, a lot of these towns are good fits for the Trump era GOP, but on the other hand they're a terrible terrible fit for the UT GOP and are in some areas becoming quite diverse--Kearns and West Valley City are minority-majority cities. This is a pretty substantial area--the section in question is around an 8th of the state's population--so it'll be interesting to see how it goes moving forward.

[Sol]

Does Tooele County have a similar character to the western Salt Lake Valley?

[Kuumo]

Does Tooele County have a similar character to the western Salt Lake Valley?

I’ve only been there a couple of times, but it didn’t seem anything like West Valley City.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

Does Tooele County have a similar character to the western Salt Lake Valley?

Tooele is 80% non-Hispanic White (the county as a whole is about the same) which already seems like a significant difference. It's also much less urbanized of course. The most famous person from Tooele County is probably Cody Reeder from the chemistry YouTube channel Cody's Lab, who is pretty much someone doing Minecraft in real life (never been to Utah but I have watched too many of his videos to let go of the opportunity to mention him) - not sure if this supports a yes or a no answer.

[jamestroll]

I kind of liked West Valley City and its non-Mormon feel. Less stuffy really. Despite the cities bad reputation, I feel immensely safer and more comfortable there than Salt Lake City proper.

For Magna, I never spent much time there. My guess that is that it remains a swingish area while the state of Utah as a whole trends Democrat. Essentially it will go from well to the left of the state to the state median at some point.

Utah Democrats have long been known to be quite liberal, but many of their sub groups are prone to GOP trend. That is the largest challenge for Utah Democrats, which is slowing down the state's Democratic trend.

There is like a zero percent chance that a statewide Democratic victory would include Carbon County. It would likely include Magna and West Valley City, but not by the margins you'd think.

[Utah Neolib]

Magna is slowly trending democratic but did have a reversion somewhat in 2022 legislative elections. Carbon, as Jimmie mentioned was once part of any statewide democratic victory but now is far less likely than San Juan to flip. West Valley seems to me like it has a more noticeable D trend and has a higher minority population. I happen to live in Tooele County and it’s population centers are conservative exurbs. 3/4 of the county land wise is almost uninhabited and dominated by the Great Salt Flats. I’ve never really thought Copperton was an actual city and more of a weird extension of Magna.

[jamestroll]

Magna is slowly trending democratic but did have a reversion somewhat in 2022 legislative elections. Carbon, as Jimmie mentioned was once part of any statewide democratic victory but now is far less likely than San Juan to flip. West Valley seems to me like it has a more noticeable D trend and has a higher minority population. I happen to live in Tooele County and it’s population centers are conservative exurbs. 3/4 of the county land wise is almost uninhabited and dominated by the Great Salt Flats. I’ve never really thought Copperton was an actual city and more of a weird extension of Magna.

Yea, and as the 2022 Senate election showed... Davis County would have to be a draw.

I was little surprised that Davis County was a little bit close in the Senate election compared to Weber County. Though in an actual Democratic statewide victory, Weber would probably flip first.

There was a time when Tooele was considered a swing county. It was close in the 2000 gubernatorial election. At that time Salt Lake County couldn't produce many Democratic split voters. Otherwise, Orton would have had a better shot. Even in 2004, Tooele was a bit closer than the statewide margin and I vaguely remember reading that it was considered a "must win" for Scott Matheson against Huntsman.

Tooele gave a landslide victory to Jan Graham in the 1996 attorney general election. Davis County as essentially tied. Graham was able to put up an impressive, at the time, showing in Salt Lake County.

Today Tooele would be a landslide for the GOP even in a statewide Democratic breakthrough.
 

[jamestroll]

My ranking of counties in Utah towards a Democratic victory.

Dark Blue:

Salt Lake County: Must get to 60% for Democrats. Challenge to that is the number of Mormons in the area. While largely liberal, it does attract more conservatives as transplants than Colorado.

Natural Blue: Democrats must win these to win state. Though I am more iffy about San Juan. Summit will be easy. Piece of case, but I think there is a ceiling there. Grand has to be won obviously. Sometimes Grand County is close based on popular local Republican politicians.

Light Blue: Davis County would have to be a draw likely based on the 2022 election results. A coincidence to the last statewide victory for Democrats in 1996. A small defeat here for Democrats would not through them out.

Medium Blue: Weber County likely a must win to win statewide.

Very light Blue: Wasatch County flipping or being close would indicate a larger than a 1 or 2 point victory for Democrats.

Dark Red: Former counties that have voted for local/state Democrats in the past. But we can FORGET ABOUT THEM!!!!!!!!! I HATE THOSE HICKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Emery County voted for Jim Matheson as recently as 2010. Democrats will not carry Juab, Tooele, Carbon, and Emery. Even in a statewide victory.  Juab County has had some weirdly close elections in the past and at random. But not in this era.

Medium Red: Will be GOP no matter what. Margins may matter.

Bright Red: Will obviously be Republican, but this is where margins can make a tremendous difference. This Democrat who wins Utah statewide will likely carry the city of Provo in Utah County. Cache County may be weirdly interesting.

[jamestroll]

Places like Magna, Kearns, and West Valley City are considered to be more working class and more affordable. That has attracted more Latinos and non-whites to those areas obviously.

They are largely clean areas, with little crime relative to their reputation, and urban and suburban amenities. 

From parts of Kearns, Utah you can see into the valley which is a beautiful site and the Quirrah Mountains are underrated. Being less developed than the Wasatch Mountains brings their own advantages.

Though definitely watch out for property crime in those areas. Its quite notorious, but is not a violent area in the least.

West Valley City does not have a real city center as it was created as a combination of multiple cities. They were Redwood, Granger, Hunter, plus Chesterfield.  Maybe West Valley City should take in Kearns and Magna! It would make SENSE.

It is just unknown and foreign to the rest of the State of Utah which brings fear.

Like I said the mountains out there aren't as used recreationally. But I will say I have attended concerts in the area! Lots of latinos there as well. When I used Grindr in Utah, it would often bring me to that area!!!

[Hope For A New Era]

That area is trending more slowly than the rest. It's a combination of trends canceling each other out (working class, Magna in particular being a historical mining town) and a sort of statistical illusion. Those areas are less Mormon, but they're less Mormon because they're more minority. The whites in these areas (who are the trenders, because the minorities are already D) are more Mormon than those in the east. That's slowing things down.

Copperton, by the way, is a Clinton-Trump town. By small margins both ways, but still.


As for future trends, I anticipate that the suburbanness will eventually win out in West Valley City/Magna/Kearns, and arguably already is. It'll just be slow.

Copperton is small enough that you can't really make long term predictions like this. It'll be chaotic.

Does Tooele County have a similar character to the western Salt Lake Valley?

It does not. It's kind of its own thing, really, though that may change in the future. It's growing pretty fast at the moment.

Magna is slowly trending democratic but did have a reversion somewhat in 2022 legislative elections.

they somehow managed to win like three seats by one point. that was disappointing

[ProgressiveModerate]

My ranking of counties in Utah towards a Democratic victory.

Dark Blue:

Salt Lake County: Must get to 60% for Democrats. Challenge to that is the number of Mormons in the area. While largely liberal, it does attract more conservatives as transplants than Colorado.

Natural Blue: Democrats must win these to win state. Though I am more iffy about San Juan. Summit will be easy. Piece of case, but I think there is a ceiling there. Grand has to be won obviously. Sometimes Grand County is close based on popular local Republican politicians.

Light Blue: Davis County would have to be a draw likely based on the 2022 election results. A coincidence to the last statewide victory for Democrats in 1996. A small defeat here for Democrats would not through them out.

Medium Blue: Weber County likely a must win to win statewide.

Very light Blue: Wasatch County flipping or being close would indicate a larger than a 1 or 2 point victory for Democrats.

Dark Red: Former counties that have voted for local/state Democrats in the past. But we can FORGET ABOUT THEM!!!!!!!!! I HATE THOSE HICKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Emery County voted for Jim Matheson as recently as 2010. Democrats will not carry Juab, Tooele, Carbon, and Emery. Even in a statewide victory.  Juab County has had some weirdly close elections in the past and at random. But not in this era.

Medium Red: Will be GOP no matter what. Margins may matter.

Bright Red: Will obviously be Republican, but this is where margins can make a tremendous difference. This Democrat who wins Utah statewide will likely carry the city of Provo in Utah County. Cache County may be weirdly interesting.

Largely agree, but I think Ds path relies disproportionately on SLC County; I think they'd need to get to about 63% or so there because as you suggest, Ds prolly have hard ceilings in the more rural and heavily mormon parts of the state. I also think Davis and Weber will converge a bit as Davis seems to be losing it's Mormon influence faster, in part as a result of SLC spillover (though Weber is prolly less Mormon to begin with).