Election 09: Suburban voters are coming back to their GOP home
Educated, affluent, secular suburbanites had been swinging to Obama and the Democrats. No more.
The big news coming out of the 2009 election is confirmation that suburban voters are returning to their Republican home. Consider this commentary from National Journal’s Michael Barone:
I want to credit for this observations longtime Democratic pollster and political analyst Pat Caddell: affluent suburban voters moved sharply toward Republicans in 2009.
Bergen County, New Jersey, a 56%-42% Corzine constituency in 2005, came within a point or two of voting for Christie, and in Virginia McDonnell carried 51%-49% Fairfax County — Republican for years but recently, [due to] cultural issues and with an increasing immigrant population, Democratic (60%-39% Obama in 2008).
In addition, Westchester County, New York, voted 58%-42% for a Republican county executive after voting almost exactly the opposite way, in a race involving the same two candidates, four years before. The Philadelphia suburban counties, increasingly Democratic in 1996, 2000, 2004, and 2008, voted Republican in a partisan race for the Supreme Court in 2009.
From the 1996 election up through and including 2008, affluent counties in the East, Midwest, and West have trended Democratic, largely through distaste for the religious and cultural conservatives whom voters there have seen (not without reason) as dominant in the Republican party. Now, with the specter of higher tax rates and a vastly expanded public sector, they may be — possibly — headed in the other direction. An interesting trend to watch.
"Interesting" is an understatement. The movement of affluent, well educated, secular suburban moderates from Republican to Democrat is the tectonic shift that has realigned American politics, elected Barack Obama, and produced Democratic victories in Washington state. If these voters continue to move back towards the GOP, the 2010 and 2012 elections will be very interesting indeed.
I suspect we will see this trend replicated as we continue to count votes in the King County Executive’s race. The last SurveyUSA poll showed that Dow Constantine was on the way to a comfortable victory because in the closing stages of the campaign he succeeded in making this a partisan race. Democrats were overwhelmingly with Constantine, while Republicans overwhelmingly supported Susan Hutchison. There are over twice as many self-described Democrats in King County as there are self-described Republicans. Pretty simple math.
But the same poll showed Hutchison winning among independents, and I anticipate she will outpoll Constantine in most, if not all the suburban legislative districts that have replaced Republican legislators with Democrats in recent years. His victory was won in Seattle.
The bottom line is, George W. Bush no longer defines American politics. If Dino Rossi had done as well as Susan Hutchison did in King County in either 2004 or 2008, he would be governor today. (Timing is everything in politics.) If Republicans field strong candidates next year, they can win back a number of suburban legislative seats.
As we saw in polling beginning this summer, President Obama is letting Republicans back into the game, especially in the suburbs.
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Comments:
Posted Wed, Nov 4, 4 p.m. inappropriate
I think you are something out of nothing.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-november-3-2009/indecision-2009---reindecision-2008-and-beyond
Posted Wed, Nov 4, 5:40 p.m. inappropriate
Chris,
I'm an Independent that voted for Hutchinson based on her being fiscally conservative. Dow Constantine was literally the LAST person I wanted to win KCExec. There were some eastside Dem's who would have done a good job as well.
When is the Republican party in this state going to stop running culturally conservative candidates in Western WA?
Seriously- how many times do you have to LOSE elections or have moderate Republican's leave for the Democratic party to figure this out?
Most mainstream Republicans and Independents (in this state) want their kids to have access to birth control, don't think abortions should be illegal and don't think what gay couples do really affects them much.
Why keep losing over these issues?
There are much more relevant principals the Republicans can bring to the table in smaller government and more if you take the other issues off the table.
This is how Dow sunk Susan.
He swiftboated her and she did not defend herself.
Posted Wed, Nov 4, 6:55 p.m. inappropriate
Wishful thinking, Chris.
Only someone of your extremist ideology and twisted views could miss the obvious. The Republicans were the only alternative to those who are suffering economically and wanted to send some sort of a message; current polling shows that only 19% of American voters feel Republicans have the right ideas about public policy.
The Republicans are far from where they were when they absolutely dominated the suburbs throughout the country. As the suburbs becomes increasingly younger, browner, and more diverse, the nails will only go deeper into the coffin of the GOP.
Will the Republicans occasionally win an election in the suburbs? Of course. Just as the Democrats can occasionally be elected governor in places like Kansas. An abberation doesn't make a trend. Wise up.
Posted Wed, Nov 4, 8:23 p.m. inappropriate
I'm still trying to get past the headline allusion to "their GOP home." A political party is not a religion, a culture or a blood line. It is a set of political values and principles that can change over time.
The Republican party of today has little to no resemblance to the Republican party that had the loyalty of my grandparents and parents. The term "Rockefeller Republican", which described the big tent party to which my family belonged, is uttered with disdain by Republican party leaders these days. So, no, Chris, there's no "GOP home" involved here for a lot of us suburbanites. The Democratic party has morphed, recruiting good candidates from among us centrist DLC types ... which is good ... because Perot's flirtation with a third party didn't work out very well.
Suburban voters will continue to look for the most qualified candidates, the people who are problem-solvers, fiscally prudent, who value the contribution of both business and labor, who advocate equality for all, are mindful of our need to provide stewardship of the environment ... and who are committed to giving the largest number of us the opportunities to succeed through education and training.
Posted Thu, Nov 5, 7:20 a.m. inappropriate
It is sort of like Ronald Reagan, who was once an active Democrat. Didn't Reagan say something like: the party left me?
There is another thing going on: the definition of suburbs is changing. The Eastside of King County is increasingly a conurbation filled with people with diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds.
Vance likes to note that Seattle was once a Republican city.
Would the GOP be also waiting for Seattle to "come home." It wasn't all that long ago that Slade Gorton, Dan Evans and Ken Eikenberry began their political careers in Seattle.
It looks to me like we've seen a generational change. Not a backward "going home." The fact is that this state's GOP has demonstrated it has little to nothing to offer a sweeping majority of relatively well educated urban voters.
Posted Thu, Nov 5, 8:01 a.m. inappropriate
I'll preface by saying that I haven't looked over the data nationwide. For each individual race--Virginia, New Jersey, NY-23, NYC mayor, and Washington state--one can almost always point to specific factors that caused the race to turn out in that way. Particular qualities or defects in the candidates, specific local issues, unusual election circumstances, etc. Only by looking at many races around the country can a national trend be determined. Do you have the data to point to a national trend, or just a few anecdotes?
As for the King County Executive race, I think that Susan Hutchison had several things going for her that made her appealing to moderates and independents. The main thing was her nonpartisan message and focus on pragmatic, rather than ideological, approaches to problems. Another factor was the fact that Dow Constantine ran a partisan campaign, focusing on "values" rather than problem-solving. Thus Hutchison might have done well among independents despite, rather than because of, a national trend. I think that Hutchison did better among indepedents than Rossi because she was more appealing to independents than Rossi, not because of timing.
To conclude, it might also be worth noting that I-1033 is the first Eyman anti-tax initiative to fail, and it failed by a wide margin. Can one read a statewide trend into this fact?
Posted Thu, Nov 5, 8:37 a.m. inappropriate
I hope you are right, Chris, it would be nice to have two (breathing) political parties in Western Washington.
Posted Thu, Nov 5, 9:43 a.m. inappropriate
Chris - I hate to deflate your optimism with facts...but, as of today, Dow leads 57.53% to 42.26%. This is not a result to cheer about.
Sure, the count isn't final, and the precinct by precinct canvas is not yet available. But I don't see much room for optimism.
Ross Kane
Warm Beach
Posted Thu, Nov 5, 9:52 a.m. inappropriate
Politics is part art, and part science. I certainly have strong opinions, but I try and let data and facts drive my writing and analysis.
Clearly, Republicans did better with suburban voters in NJ and Virginia, and in the other races Barone cited.
In King County. Hutchison is going to finish above 40%. McCain got 28% in King County, Rossi 36%. I really doubt that is due to a shift in Seattle.
We will really know more once we get the election results by legislative district.
Posted Thu, Nov 5, 12:16 p.m. inappropriate
The Republican party in Washington is still suffering from the putsch that the "Jesus Nazis" staged in the mid-80s. Like insular liberals in Seattle, these insular cultural conservatives all get together in their social echo chambers and tell each other that they have all the answers and that all those opposed to them are sinister. It's no coincidence that the surge in popularity of the state Libertarian party happened at the same time. If the Republican party is going to succeed in this state it needs to understand that the vast majority of non-liberal voters want the government to do one thing: Stop being a drag on people's lives and businesses. That means stop being parasitic. That means do the essential jobs that people will not spontaneously organize to do themselves, and otherwise get the hell out of the way. I'm convinced that abortion is a yawn-inducing issue for most people for whom it is not their single issue, left or right.
Posted Thu, Nov 5, 5:18 p.m. inappropriate
Dino Rossi was a "prefers GOP" candidate.
Susan was a "nonpartisan" candidate.
The problem is, they can't run away from the tainted Republican brand fast enough.
Posted Fri, Nov 6, 11:40 a.m. inappropriate
The Christofascists and Corporatists who have run the GOP and the country directly into an iceberg will have to get in their own lifeboats - sane reasonable citizens won't have them in theirs.
Posted Tue, Nov 10, 3:35 p.m. inappropriate
For obvious reasons, Mr. Vance and other GOPs want to read as much as possible into the Gov wins for their party in Virginia and New Jersey. In each of the states, the Democratic candidate was deeply flawed..Mr. Deeds in Virginia ran a disorganized and reactive campaign, and wasted much time on non-issues. Mr. Corzine in NJ was finishing a four-year term full of tax hikes and other broken promises. The real GOP story on election day, as Chris and other GOPs actually know, was the collapse of the party stucture in upstate New York in the special House race...moderate and pragmatic GOPs were attacked and demonized by the radical right, and all it did was hand the seat to the Dems for the first time in more than 100 years. The GOP brand will continue to be poison as long as the far right keeps treating it as a religion and not a political party. Oh, and the last I checked, the GOPs don't have any legislative seats on the east side of Seattle except for the 5th district...when I was growing up, it was solid GOP.
Posted Mon, Nov 16, 8:37 p.m. inappropriate
"I suspect we will see this trend replicated as we continue to count votes in the King County Executive’s race."
Have you no shame Mr. Vance?
If not, I do hope you have a sense of self-deprecating humor.