Some of the same messages that are going to work in Northeastern Ohio are maybe not going to work as well down here, said county GOP Chairman Alex Triantafilou. Profiled by BBC News weeks before the 2020 election, locals said voters' political identities weren't always defined in strict party terms and that people would regularly pivot between parties from one election cycle to the next. If they are tipping to Clinton, it's over. A few counties in America are known as the "bellwether counties": Those locations that always end up voting for the candidate who ultimately wins in the presidential election. Watauga has gone for the winner statewide in each of the last three presidential elections and three Senate races since 2008. So, where are the bellwether counties? The magnitude of the gap (or difference) is an indicator of the strength of the change in sentiment. He will need to cut into Clintons advantage here in North Carolinas second-most populous county since Clinton is likely to roll up the score in Democratic Mecklenburg County (Charlotte). Once-reliably Republican -- and essential to Republicans to help overcome the deficit they face in Las Vegas Clark County -- Washoe voted twice for Bush and then twice for Obama. Follow us on Telegram to be notified when we release the remaining articles. BBC Reality Check breaks down the bill for the world's most expensive election, Arriving at a voting station to observe as a poll challenger on 4 November last, she sat down next to two people she didn't know. Enter Donald Trump. Find Stephen on Twitter and Instagram, The Americans who almost always predict the president, China looks at reforms to deepen Xi's control, Historic ocean treaty agreed after decade of talks, Inside the enclave surrounded by pro-Russia forces, 'The nurses wanted me to feel guilty about my abortion, From Afghan TV fame to a US factory floor. Traditional Republican eastern counties of Carroll, Belknap and Rockingham, home to Portsmouth, fell back to the GOP in 2012, but not by enough for Romney, who had a home in the state, to win. Ron Elving . Potential canaries in the coal mine, aside from Montgomery, include Wood, south of Toledo, and Stark, home to Canton and the pro-football Hall of Fame in northeastern Ohio. That Trump did so well in the remaining 19 bellwether counties in 2020 should come as no surprise, then. Marcela Stewart speaks to a voter at an event to encourage minority voter turnout n Cutler Bay, Fla., on Sunday. In each of the past three presidential elections, Arizona has had four consistently Democratic counties (Apache, Coconino, Pima, Santa Cruz) and 11 Republican ones (Cochise, Gila, Graham, Greenlee, La Paz, Maricopa, Mohave, Navajo, Pinal, Yavapai and Yuma). Split-Ticket Voters Helped Biden, Republicans in Nebraska, Maine, Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. Latest voter registration totals:Democrats: 105,724Republicans: 70,060Unaffiliated: 15,141Other: 6,079. . This was important for candidates since the presidential candidate's campaign would normally foot the bill. 2016 winners: Bernie Sanders (Democratic caucus); Ted Cruz (GOP state convention)2012: Obama 51%, Romney 46%, Latestvoter registration totals:Unaffiliated: 128,938Republicans: 111,374Democrats: 109,140Libertarian: 3,388. It gets a lot more interesting. With such overwhelming Democrat support in 2008, one can only surmise that ALL these 25 counties would have switched back to the Democrat party in 2020. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here. "There are more and more places in this country that are consistently red or blue, so there are fewer and fewer counties that swing back and forth from election to election," he said. This Gulf Coast county is home to Tampa and has gone with the statewide winner in every presidential election since 1960. The best bellwether counties will consistently vote more than 50% for the winning party. Find the answer by searching politico.com/2020-election/results. A county that voted for the winning party in 1992 (Democrat), 2000 (Republican), 2008 (Democrat) and 2016 (Republican), irrespective of how they voted at the other elections. His win in 2012 was by a smaller margin in Forsyth County than in 2008, as the state flipped back to Mitt Romney. The second-most populous county in the state, northern Nevadas Washoe County is home to Reno. From 1980 through 2016, there were19 counties that consistently voted for the eventual president. Statewide results: 2012: Romney 57%-41% - 2008: McCain 55%-44%. Multiple factors, including higher turnout and population growth, contributed to the fact that both Biden and Trump totaledmore votes than Obama. A total of 35 counties voted for the winner of each presidential election from 1980 through 2012. Re-doing the analysis we obtain 35 modern bellwether counties after the 2016 election. 7. But since it's gotten so much attention this cycle with the possibility that independent Evan McMullin siphons off votes from Trump, we kept it in here. Latest voter registration totals: Unaffiliated: 49,026Democrats: 40,563Republicans: 35,146. 12. These are the bellwether counties. The question is, how much did they get it wrong by? The odds of 21 counties out of 22 missing the mark is extremely remote! In 2018, Senator Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, carried it by 11 points . They are: Notice RANSOM, SARGENT, and MARSHALL in particular. Both Clinton and Trump need to turn out their bases in Fulton (Atlanta). It also backed Gov. Arizona (11 electoral votes) - Lean Republican. When is Eurovision and how do you get tickets? The Atlantic wonders why we're still arguing about masks. Just a tiny fraction of them truly matter. 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Clements, Identifying Electoral Fraud Using Trend Analysis, View the County & Local Organizing Playbook, Find the latest updates on our Telegram channel, Bellwether counties are not just statistical curiosities, The odds of 21 (out of 22) of these counties getting it wrong is, We have identified and analyzed the best of the best bellwether counties at predicting an election outcome, and examined their trends in 2020. America's most accurate bellwether counties, regions that have a reputation for accurately picking the president, got the presidential election completely wrong. An Inquiry of Bellwether Counties in US Presidential Elections, 1980-2016 Daniel Zimny-Schmitt1, Michael C. Harris2 1. Winnebago County: A large bellwether county in east-central Wisconsin, Mr. Trump won it in 2016, but in 2018 Democrats running for governor and the Senate performed much better. Other counties to watch: Perhaps no state more starkly displays the broader rural-urban divide in this country than Virginia. Yes, another Hillsborough! She says that previously, "when there was a presidential election, people are watching, paying attention, and as soon as the president is elected, they forget [about politics] until it's election time again". Racine County, which features a significant Hispanic and African American population, is the only competitive county bordering Milwaukee Ozaukee, Waukesha and Washington counties are reliably Republican. These counties arent the only ones that matter most swing states have a handful of critical counties, not just one or two but these 25 stand out, either for their voting history, population size or traditional impact on swing-state election results. The highest percentage being 66.1%. But its been a nail-biter in the past four presidential elections. Arguably, it was 2016 and not 2020 when bellwether counties first showed signs of falling by the wayside, given their dramatic swing to the right in that election. Experts say that while traditional bellwether counties are whiter and less educated than the national average, there's no one element that unites them as political oracles. So the question is, how many of them switched back to the Democrat party in 2020? In 2012, it had nearly half a million more voters in it than every other county in the state combined. One of the big four suburban collar counties ringing Philadelphia and the fourth-most populous county in the state Bucks is always competitive. To flip Pennsylvania, Trump has to start in Bucks and expand in places like Northampton. Other counties to watch: Pima (where Tucson is). Whether or not these less diverse, industry-dependent communities can regain their bellwether status in four years' time remains to be seen. Statewide results: 2012: Obama 51%-48% - 2008: Obama 52%-47%. What does this mean for the nation's political-economic divide? Here are the top 25 counties which voted over 60% for the Democrat party in 2008, and then voted Republican in 2016: There is no doubt these 25 counties heavily favor the Democrat party. Warren and Henry Counties appear to be the least swingy of those counties from 2008 to 2012. "I said: 'I'm the chair of the Democratic Party,' and the gentleman looked at me and said: 'Oh, the enemy.'". The following county is the only county to have voted for the winner of the presidential election in every election starting in 1980: The following 44 counties have deviated from the winner of the presidential election in one election since 1980 (no counties deviated from the winner in 1980, 1984, or 1996):[3][4]. Latest voter registration totals:Democrats: 316,586Republicans: 258,725No Party Affiliation: 206,457Others: 22,695. Read about our approach to external linking. The more people can work out and see for themselves that the data clearly indicates a different outcome, the better. Here are the top 30 sorted by the highest to lowest Democrat percentage vote in 2008, thats the DPV 08 column: Find out at politico.com/2020-election/results. Key Counties: The race here is not binary, so watching the margins in the biggest counties will be important. But demographic change appears to have tipped the county slightly more in Democrats' direction. Driving up the margins in those places will be key for Clinton. Statewide results: 2012: Obama 53%-46% - 2008: Obama 56%-42%. Yet Donald Trump received 10 million more votes in 2020 than in 2016 -- and lost. And notably, the 16 counties that lost their bellwether status in 2016 are more racially diverse (median of 46 percent non-Hispanic white, compared to 89 percent) and more highly educated (median of 27 percent of adults 25 or older with a bachelors degree or higher, compared to 22 percent) than the 19 counties that maintained their bellwether status. Almost a quarter of Obama's votes in 2012 came out of Wayne County (Detroit), which is 41 percent black. Along with neighboring Pinellas County (St. Petersburg), the two counties include nearly a half-million registered Republicans.