Western swing congressional districts
Polidata (thanks Basie for the link) has put together the first run down on what congressional districts "swung" last November. The thought goes that these districts buck the trend of congressional districts throughout the country moving to the wings of politics.
On first blush, the interesting districts include John Salazar's district in western Colorado (CO-3) and Republican Bob Beauprez's (CO-7) in central Colorado. Look at the map, you'll see more of these kind of districts (in baby blue and pink) spotting the West. They all have something in common: generally they are suburbs.
Well, over all suburbs, but with large ranging rural areas. The districts that swung are going to be the core of where the Democratic Party will rise in the West. These are districts that have all of the characteristics of the West that Democrats can win in.
Rapid growth, you can call them exurbs, but I'm not sure that name fits in the West. For these areas, the old party loyalties don't really apply yet.
Dependence on natural resources. Not always straight up resource extraction industries, so this would include what some might call eco-tourism (I don't). These are people that might see some good in leaving that water in the creek or that tree still standing.
As a side note, the one southern California swing district was Loretta Sanchez's of Orange County, the lady that beat crazy Bob Dornan back in the day. Apparently the good old CA-47 -- which I often cite as an example of Western suburban Republican districts that could swing Democrat, especially in the Southwest -- still has some GOP tendencies. This, even though Loretta beat her challenger by 20 points.
Emmett O'Connell | March 30, 2005 | Comment on This Post (9 so far) |
Your Name: Your Personal Note: | Your Email: Friends' Emails*: |
Comments
Emmett:
I can't vouch for the reset of the states, but Oregon is wrong. All 5 congressional seats stayed with incumbents last election. The whole state should be blue except the eastern 2/3 (which is one, big congressional district).
Am I missing something? Is this map supposed to represent something other than congressional districts broken out by party with lighter shades indicating a switch in party?
-- Bert Lowry
Posted by: Bert Lowry | Mar 31, 2005 11:03:59 AM
From what I can tell from a quick and dirty rundown of the 5th district, Bush barely beat Kerry. If you include all of the counties invovled (even the ones that share congressional districts) Bush won 222,722 to 215,302. If you take out Clackamas and Benton counties (which are shared) the difference actually climbs to 106,571 for Bush and 93,658 for Kerry.
Unless the 5th district contains the most liberal portions of Clackamas and Benton, its pretty likely that Bush carried the district.
Posted by: Emmett O'Connell | Mar 31, 2005 4:18:20 PM
Bert -- Oregon is not all Blue, or have you forgotten how close the gubenatorial race from 2002 was??
The belt in the Salem area is a classic swing area. Darlene Hooley won, but that's due to who the GOP ran against her more than anything else.
Posted by: ChrisB | Mar 31, 2005 5:43:05 PM
Ah. I misunderstood. I thought it was a map of US Representatives by party.
I now surmise that it is presidential voting broken out along Congressional District lines. Pink represents a district that voted for Bush for president but a Democrat for congress. I'm surprised that any districts except the third are blue.
-- Bert Lowry
Posted by: Bert Lowry | Apr 1, 2005 4:38:34 PM
As I've said here before, winning has more to do with the candidates than anything else. If the candidates are ho hummers, then the demographics play huge. But voters will swing for personality.
If western Dems produce some great personalities who have a balanced approach, you'll see a lot more blue. If the Dems continue to produce candidates who are not sympathetic to rural issues; candidates whom rural voters can't "trust", that map will stay red.
Overall I like the concept of a western Democrat as has been articulated on this site before. But I don't think that type of democrat is what we have here in Oregon for the most part. Among party activists and candidates I see traditional metro/rural divides.
They may live side by side, but the metro and rural cultures are miles apart.
It's going to take more than demographic shifts and gerrymandering to make that map look blue. And frankly I doubt that most party activists are ready to embrace that. I hope I'm wrong.
Posted by: Chris Edwards | Apr 2, 2005 11:07:37 PM
Not sure I understand the map either, but NV-1 (urban core of Clark County) should certainly be blue and NV-3 is certainly a swing district. Bush carried it narrowly and its held in the House by a republican but party reg favors Dems (narrowly) and a majority of the district is represented in Carson City and on the Clark County Council by Democrats.
If we can find a strong candidate who can raise adequate money, Porter is still very vulnerable -- esp if a more aggressive D3C can force the RNCC to spend its money elsewhere (like defending Delay) rather than attacking Porter's opponent (which is how he won in 02 and 04).
Posted by: desmoulins | Apr 3, 2005 10:41:14 PM
The only thing the map shows is preference for President and house. If its both R or D, its deep blue or red. If it swings one way or the other, say with R house and D prez, its light blue, D House, and R prez, light red.
Posted by: Emmett O'Connell | Apr 4, 2005 7:59:35 AM
Thanks for the clarification Emmett, but "Polidata" still seems to have at least the corner of the West where I life (NV-1) wrong; it went for Kerry and is represented by a Dem (Berkeley) in Congress.
Posted by: desmoulins | Apr 5, 2005 10:07:31 PM
The West is shaping up as the battleground for 2006, and the campaign has already started. See
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/07/AR2005050701001.html?referrer=email&referrer=email
"Still writing 2004 on your contribution checks? Well, wake up: The 2006 congressional campaign is already underway. Vice President Cheney did a pair of fundraisers for House Republicans on Friday, following two others he did in April. He's got another one Monday, then one next Friday. An aide calls it the "kickoff" to the 2006 cycle."
...
"Cheney's first efforts are going to some of the more endangered House Republicans. He did events in April for Mike Fitzpatrick (Pa.) and Mike Sodrel (Ind.). Friday it was Rick Renzi (Ariz.) and Heather Wilson (N.M.). Monday it will be Marilyn Musgrave (Colo.), and then comes Charles Boustany (La.).
[Half of these are in the West]
Posted by: Leo Brown | May 8, 2005 7:01:10 AM
Ads by Google
(and yes, we know that sometimes they're very, very wrong. Other times, they're right on.)
