How Donald Trump’s Candidacy Is Affecting Politics in the South
As we approach the end of the 2016 election cycle, what had appeared to point to a blowout election for Democrat Hillary Clinton has tightened considerably, with late state-by-state polls showing Republican Donald Trump narrowing her lead. Because of Electoral College math, Clinton is still favored, but some states she had hoped to turn appear to be slipping far out of her grasp.
One of these states is here in Georgia, where recent polling has Donald Trump up between five and seven points, and the Real Clear Politics average has him leading Clinton by 5.4 points. And accordingly, Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball today moved the Peach State from Leans Republican to Likely Republican. The Crystal Ball now sees Florida and one seat each in Nebraska and Maine as tossups, and overall gives Clinton a 293 to 214 vote lead in the Electoral College — meaning the tossups won’t affect the election’s outcome.
Irregardless of how the vote comes down next Tuesday, however, the unlikely candidacy of Donald Trump has brought about a change in American politics that will last well beyond 2016. One big effect, according to a story in the New York Times, is a move to the left in the upper South and interior West as a result of women and minorities being turned off by Trump.
Stacey Abrams, the Democratic leader in the Georgia House of Representatives, said the presidential race had been a “godsend election,” opening the eyes of national Democrats to unimagined opportunities in her state. Priorities USA Action, a “super PAC” supporting Mrs. Clinton, is spending more than $2 million in Georgia.
Shaking hands last week in a lunchtime crowd at a mall in south DeKalb County, Ms. Abrams said the electoral calculus in Georgia had changed sharply. The booming Atlanta suburbs, she said, had opened a path to victory without winning over white conservatives — but only if Democrats were able to turn out black voters and other minorities effectively.
“Trump was helpful, because it allowed people to move past the prejudice that said you should never even think about a Deep South state being in play,” Ms. Abrams said. The dictum that elections in the South are decided by white voters, she added, “is no longer true in the Deep South.”
The Times story quotes State Rep. BJay Pak of Lilburn saying that Republicans are well aware of the demographic change. The question to be answered in the months and years ahead is how the GOP will respond.
Mr. Pak, who represents Gwinnett County, a suburban area near Atlanta where minorities now outnumber whites, said it had been hard this year to recruit a diverse slate of candidates, or to win over women and minorities.
“Donald Trump has really made it extremely difficult,” said Mr. Pak, who has not endorsed Mr. Trump. “They feel that the party’s not welcoming, and that’s a tremendous challenge when you’re trying to get people to give the party a chance.”
Wednesday evening, Democratic strategist Tharon Johnson and GOP strategist Brian Robinson got together in front of a live audience to discuss the future of politics in Georgia. Their discussion was moderated by WABE’s Denis O’Hayer, and portions will air at 7:20 and 9:20 AM Friday, November 3rd. Towards the end of the discussion the pair shared their visions of Georgia post-Trump.
Johnson maintained that a Clinton presidency combined with the failure to pass the Opportunity School District amendment would lead to a new coalition of blacks, Asians, Hispanics and whites. Robinson maintained the GOP will be able to maintainn its majority in Georgia through the 2030s by becoming more diverse and by promoting opportunities for everyone to advance.
How the parties respond after next Tuesday will show which vision is more accurate.
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Jon Richards
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How about the other side of the equation where Trump’s candidacy helped increase GOP turnout thus theoretically expanding the party. Why do certain folks constantly claim the GOP is a ‘big tent party’ then criticize Trump for actually making the tent bigger? He got more primary votes than any GOP candidate in history despite facing 16 other GOPers. Turnout is way up in counties normally voting red which also points to an expanding party.
Dems on the other hand are seeing a significant drop in black voter participation – http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/01/politics/early-voting-update-black-vote-decreasing/ – Georgia for example has seen early black voters decline from 36% in 2012 to 31% this time. Seems to me the dems have a much bigger problem going forward if they start losing black voters as is taking place already.
How do they determine the race of someone voting early?
Not sure, but this is the quote from CNN – “But if Clinton is going to pull off the upset here, she’ll need strong turnout from African-Americans — and there are signs that their share of the vote has dropped a bit from where it was at this point in 2012. Black voters made up 36% of Georgia’s early voting population at this stage of the 2012 race, compared to 31% this year.”
The registered voter file keeps track of the race of the voter. There’s also an absentee voter file that’s updated daily to show who voted early. By matching the two files, it’s possible to tell the race of the people voting early. This of course does not tell how people voted.
Thanks Jon.
Here is another story about the topic focused on NC – http://www.insight-us.org/blog/african-american-early-voting-is-way-down-in-north-carolina-why-is-that/ – they attribute the decline there to Hurricane Matthew.
Ah yes. That was actually kind of a dumb question now that I think about it.
Bart, I’m calling BS on the “Trump is expanding the GOP” line. What is your evidence of that? Please don’t use the primary voters tally – studies have shown that those aren’t new voters, they are people who vote in the general election who decided to vote in the primary.
Jon, I think the primary showed an increase, but beyond that:
From CNN 10/30 – “Georgia has crossed the 1 million mark in terms of ballots cast. More than 1,061,000 people have already hit the polls in the Peach State — a spike of about 37% from this time in 2012.
Voters do not register with a party in Georgia, so it’s impossible to know whether Democrats or Republicans are ahead in turnout. But the state does compile statistics on the racial breakdown of the voters. So far, the electorate is slightly less diverse than it was at this point in 2012. Turnout among white voters rose by about 3%, while turnout among black voters is down by about 4.5%.”
It is a given that the majority of GOP voters are more likely to vote on election day instead of early voting. Yet this cycle we see a significant increase in red county early voting combined with an overall decline in early black voters. Overall early voting is up significantly from 2012 when the GOP had a less than desirable candidate in the guy who actually created ObamaCare before it was ObamaCare. It seems the current GOP candidate is causing an increase in early turnout.
Since GA doesn’t require party registration, there is no way to be sure. But I am confident there will be a significant increase over the 2078688 votes Romney received in 2012 or McCain’s 2048759 from 2008. Trump not only draws a large contingent of formerly active GOPers like myself, he brings in new voters who have not participated at all in previous elections. We will find out for sure sometime next Wednesday.
“But I am confident there will be a significant increase over the 2078688 votes Romney received in 2012 or McCain’s 2048759 from 2008.”
As ever, the population of Georgia is not constant. He and Clinton both may draw more votes than anyone in their party has ever won in the history of the state. But that’ll be because more people (and more voters) live in Georgia than ever have before in the history of the state. So Trump could shrink the state GOP a little more in percentage terms (the state’s been getting closer from the high-water-mark of Bush’s 17 pt win in ’04) even as his raw vote a little more.
On the other and, this from Stacy Abrams is just nonsense:
“Shaking hands last week in a lunchtime crowd at a mall in south DeKalb County, Ms. Abrams said the electoral calculus in Georgia had changed sharply. The booming Atlanta suburbs, she said, had opened a path to victory without winning over white conservatives — but only if Democrats were able to turn out black voters and other minorities effectively.
“Trump was helpful, because it allowed people to move past the prejudice that said you should never even think about a Deep South state being in play,” Ms. Abrams said. The dictum that elections in the South are decided by white voters, she added, “is no longer true in the Deep South.””
Virginia and North Carolina show the way forward, and it’s winning moderate white suburbanites. The idea that you can just win any of those states without appealing to white votes is nonsense–and that’s now how Democrats have changed the political calculus of those states. It’s not decided by winning a majority of white voters–something that was always true after 1964 in the South–but instead about weaving together coalitions.
I’ll paraphrase TJ’s comment: Clearing throat…”Donald Trump, at least in this state, is gonna beat Hillary like a rented mule.” Now my words: After last night’s carpet bombshells, her effort has begun a slow circling of the campaign drain. Hillary is a crook, many times over. To quote esteemed political consultant, Clayborn Darden, “It’s ovaaaaaaaaa…”
Bart, again, I ask where you are coming up with this mythical increase? Let’s look at the difference in Georgia voter registrations between 2016 and 2016. Statewide, you can see that white voter registration was down a tenth of a percent. White share of the electorate was down by .8%. Meanwhile minority voters continued to increase, accounting for all of the 1.4% increase in registered voters.
Jon if all whites vote GOP and all blacks vote dem then your post has merit. But since we cannot decide party affiliation by race alone, current data fails to provide the answer.
Based on facts that early voting is up 37% from 2012 with White turnout up 3%/black down 5% it would stand to reason that we will see an uptick in GOP support just as happened in the primary. Beyond that, it is based on a mix of anecdotal evidence pointing to a motivated GOP vote based on ‘draining the swamp’. The anti-crony corruption ‘anger’ issue has been discussed on here many times, we will see if it materializes next week in the form of a significant increase in GOP voters.