As an elections nerd, I’m interested in learning more about political shifts over times. Over the course of years and decades, many places change their politics over time. One example of this is when a major metro area grows, the city and its suburbs politics become more blue. A few examples would be Dallas and Atlanta in the recent decade. Or for a statewide example, we can use Colorado. For those of you who lived in an area that went from red to blue or blue to red, did you notice any differences in your day to day life?
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Sure. Everything from road funding to school schedules/curriculums to unemployment benefits. State elections matter. New leaders make new laws which change things.
We have legal weed now.
We do see changes, but not as often as one would think for democratic society.
You should understand that in US local dynasties and nepotism run regional/local politics. So actual changes don’t happen often. Usually nameless people have life time appointments by running elections unopposed.
Being replaced by a family member is not uncommon at all. No matter if we are talking about Republicans or Democrats or we are talking about local, state, or federal government.
Yes. Brian Kemp is Georgia’s first Republican Governor who had not previously been a democrat since reconstruction. The old, conservative/moderate democrats ran the state practically unopposed until the early 2000s.
Wyche Fowler, Zell Miller, Sam Nunn, etc were all ‘good old boys’, but were high-ranking members of the state’s Democratic Party. That sort of dynamic is non-existent today with some notable exceptions like John Barrow, Roy Barnes, etc.
There are still some dinosaurs around who are of that old party element. My great aunt for example curses General Sherman during every thanksgiving or Christmas blessing but has gone on record saying she’d rather die than vote Republican. My grandfather who was born in the 30s similarly despises republicans even though he probably agrees with them on most issues.
My state (Iowa) used to be considered purple when I was growing up in the 90’s/00’s but now it’s in a downward spiral of red that I don’t know if we can break out of. You can tell the difference, our public education used to be top in the nation now we are towards the back of the pack, roads and infrastructure woefully need updating, the brain drain of youth leaving the state is also noticeable, as are the warnings not to go near any public waters due to Big Ag polluting the entire state to hell. I see things moving in a better direction in Minnesota and am so jealous, looking to move my family and business North as soon as I can.
A lot of it has to do with demographic shifts: California, where I was born, has gone from a Republican-leaning state to a solidly blue state. I think much of it has to do with the exodus of middle class white families and the growth urban tech centers. Outside the coastal cities, California is still somewhat Republican-leaning. Tight regulations and high taxes have incentivized companies to relocate to other states like Texas, Arizona, and Utah.
I grew up in a reliably red California. When I was growing up, our state hadn’t elected a Democrat for president in mine or my parents lifetime (not counting the 1964 election where Johnson carried 44 states plus DC). We were that state that Reagan and Nixon came from. I never thought I would see the day that California went blue.
Now, LOTS of things caused California to go blue, but undoubtedly Prop. 187 and the culture that led to it had some impact. The prop passed, and was eventually overturned by the Supreme Court, but the backlash against the prop caused a movement of sorts. It’s fascinating, really. My favorite sassy video on the topic is [this one from the California Latino Caucus](https://youtu.be/MfQXiFtH0EA), and I also recommend the [Battle of 187 podcast for a more in depth dive](https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-10-15/prop-187-this-is-california-battle-podcast).
In Ohio it’s really only been the last 4-5 years or so that the state government has really changed, the 6 or 7 blue urban and suburban counties life is still pretty much the same. I do see some weird and disturbing bumper stickers and stickers on car windows in like the Costco or Sam’s Club parking lots and when you look at the plates they always have a rural county sticker on them, so things are definitely changing out there.
Not really, just the shock and bewilderment by all the new residents to the state discovering how conservative it actually is.
When I first moved to Maine over 10 years ago. It was genuinely more moderate. Pretty evenly split between conservative and liberal.
Over the past decade there’s been a distinct shift with the state becoming more solidly “blue” and yeah it’s noticeable. There’s a lot more pride flags around. The city I live in has gotten more diverse (it’s still pretty white for a U.S. city, but for Maine, which is one of the least diverse states in the nation, it’s higher than average). There’s been a lot more investment in our state social services. Weed is legal now, etc.
Sure. I’m not originally from Texas but I’ve been here a while now and there’s been a big shift, particularly since COVID started. My experiences in the state started more of a libertarian “live and let live” environment where people were generally courteous in public and would not get involved with much if it wasn’t their business. People would break the law all the time and it was no big deal, as long as it wasn’t hurting anyone.
Now it’s gone crazy where there is an oppressive overly moralistic (yet with warped morals) government that is trying to overly regulate everything. The people have changed to be much more Karen-like and constantly in everyone else’s business. For example, several years ago people would get upset and go to social media to talk about brothels being run in shopping centers or dogs being tied up 24/7 outside in the summer with no water. Now it’s to a point where Nextdoor is full of posts about “a black man walked down the street in front of my house” or “this car was driving 5mph over the speed limit at 6:00am today” crap. There’s a lot more religious zealotry than there was before and it’s impacting school boards and other political institutions where it wouldn’t have mattered before.
Also at the same time people have gotten much more selfish, mean, and the general social cohesion of the community is falling apart. People pull guns on each other constantly over small things and there’s a lot more littering and such. The attitudes that are related to this shift do impact politics as well.
New England was split between heavily union-Democratic cities and moderate Republican suburbs and rural areas. Connecticut had Democratic and Republican governors, and the state legislature regularly seesawed between Republican and Democratic control. On my first day of work in 2006, I got to meet Chris Shays, Republican of CT’s 4th district. (I’d also met him once in high school.)
Over time, the Republicans, fairly or unfairly, have been associated with the increasing craziness of the national party and have slowly lost their seats to moderate Democrats. Our current Governor, Ned Lamont, is a wealthy individual from Greenwich whose money comes from a telecom business he started and sold. As governor, he has championed responsible fiscal policy and both spoken honestly and taken action on the state’s biggest revenue vs. spending issue: unfunded pension obligations for state retirees. He’s improved the business environment in the state by attracting new employers and reducing regulations. As a result of his fiscal responsibility and legislative and administrative action, the state’s population decline has been arrested and the bond rating went up. One of the biggest achievements of this most recent legislative session was, of all things, a tax cut!
There is no better fit for Fairfield County Republican than anything I just said, and yet, he’s a Democrat whose claim to fame before his successful run for Governor was a successful primary challenge and general election loss to Joe Lieberman in 2006.
It just goes to show how much the crazies on the right have driven the non-crazies into a bigger Democratic tent.
My hometown was always a farming town, my grandparents estimate that it was 1950 when there were finally more people than cows in town. Farmers were republican, and so the town stayed Republican through the New Deal and through Kennedy when the rest of the state became a Democratic stronghold. However, in the 80s and 90s when Massachusetts started drastically improving and people moved to Boston the distance people commuted to Boston started increasing more and more. Even in my lifetime of 26 years my town has become an exurb of Boston.
And with that we’ve gotten more liberal, the Rockefeller Republican farmers have been replaced by the more liberal younger families that move here for schools and because the cost of living is lower than it is closer to Boston.
Of course in the 5 town district high school we’re still thought of as hick farmers.
My hometown suburb of Los Angeles became far more upscale over 20 years and is now a chief NIMBY opponent of solving the housing and transportation problems plaguing the city. They vote solidly blue but are guilty of “performative progressivism” – making noises about being accepting while blocking anything that actually solves the problems that impact low income people of color. That said, as a LGBT person I do feel very safe and comfortable there. When I grew up it was a more working to middle class suburb with light blue politics.
Ohio has always been a purple state, so it kinda just ebbs and flows one way or the other but never to drastically
My town has shifted a bit more red for local politics. It was due to some very boneheaded policies by a former liberal mayor and some liberal town council members. The “conservatives” we have now are essentially democrats with an R next to their name but have a little more conservative policies and they are more pragmatic and good with money.
We used to be progressive.
Here in Texas my county has shifted blue, so they gerrymandered the shit out of it in 2020 to preserve the republican status quo.
Yes
50%+ of us nationwide are at risk of losing or have lost access to healthcare options.
Our educational system is affected.
Access to social services is affected.
Local & State politics have more of an immediate impact on our daily lives than National politics do.
Things haven’t really changed here, East Tennessee has to be one of the most politically stable regions of the nation since the area has been a Republican strong hold since the Civil War
I don’t love that I can be out in my yard with my kids and somebody with a gigantic “FUCK BIDEN” flag on their truck occasionally drives by. I know a lot of people went crazy over Trump but I never saw that sort of thing during his presidency.
Edit: I’m also not super crazy about the guy nearby who has a flag on his flagpole that says “FUCK JOE BIDEN AND FUCK YOU FOR VOTING FOR HIM”
Yeah I’ve noticed an increase in young white people who hate black people in NY and Texas
Yes, in St. Louis suburb in Missouri I lived in.
It was firmly red, religious conservative when I first started living there. “Legitimate rape” guy Todd Akin was the rep there until his comments forced him out and Ann Wagner took over.
First thing I noticed was more Indian immigrant families moving in, and some Chinese immigrant families too. They were highly educated with good jobs, and wanted to send their kids to the good public schools in that area.
More Indian restaurants started opening up. Then boba shops (there was only one in the entire city when I first lived there). After I left, they reached critical mass to open the first Asian supermarket.
With that, the votes started going blue. Ann Wagner kept her seat with the thinnest margin she had ever seen.
…and so the Missouri GOP promptly redrew her district to incorporate a bunch of the outlying white, semi-rural areas to dilute the district votes and make it red again. Real democratic of them.
I bought a house in a barely, but definitely still was, Republican district in Nebraska. My state unicameral rep was John McCollister. Google him if you want as he went viral for what he said but the short version is that he is an older (he’s in his late 70s now) – old school – Republican (aka very solidly the red type) who spoke out against Trump hard. He was very unhappy with the direction the party was going and what they expected out of him. I was fine with him as a rep before he spoke out but really thrilled when he spoke out like he did. He spoke his conscience and fought as hard as he could against the changing tide of his party being ripped from him as well as making sure the Republicans were decent people. He finished his term (term limits) and I was happy that he did what he could.
It was expected that the next rep to take over (this was the 2022 election) my district would be a Trump follower as that is the direction the entire state is moving. That did not happen. Not even close. Instead we elected a middle of the pack in age Millennial! A Democrat! A mental health professional! And gay! Like could not be more different. And he is our first gay senator (we call our Unicameral reps Senators – we have no House). It was very close. He nearly didn’t win but managed somehow. I think what helped John Fredrickson win was who has moved into my district – a lot of houses sold as Boomers downsized/moved away or died either due to age or COVID. And he was part of the pack of Senators who held the Unicameral in check with the filibuster this year. I am very proud of him and proud of the other Senators involved in that. They did all they could.
In my case this was literally like a light switch and flipped over night. It wasn’t gradual at all. So yes, I noticed.
Yes, from Florida. I am in a little town that has a Drag Queen parade and crowning for the downtown merchants, BBB, and City Council. In years past it was easy to see rainbow flags or gay couples at any time not just pride. The main “dance club” is/was a gay bar and was 50/50 gay/straight any given night anytime of the year. Politically blue or purple but plenty of open acceptance anywhere you look.
However. In the past 8 years there has been a dramatic shift. There are trump signs still up in people’s yards. Some are flying Trump flags or have maga flags hanging from their houses. There are more traitor flags on big trucks along the beach.
Incredibly different in just 8 years.
*(also, fun fact, Gov Ron DeSantis graduated high school here when it was open and friendly and yet he still managed to turn into a hateful person. He’s broken)*
It depends on what level of government. The higher the level like congressional, the less they noticeably affect the average person’s day to day life.
At local levels like town mayor or sheriff, they will affect you more directly.
Honestly, not really. Neither party moves the needle drastically in day-to-day life. The main thing is that 2016 basically confirmed to society that it’s okay to display how awful of a person you are with no backlash
So I was born and raised in the south Texas(Rio grande valley) where it’s been a democratic stronghold for the last 100 years but over the last decade there has been a huge surge of republican voters. They actually just broke history a few years ago because they briefly voted in their first republican congresswomen(Mayra Flores) don’t quote me cause I might be wrong but maybe over a century. She eventually lost to the democratic congressman(no surprise) but that’s just showing the once democratic stronghold is now starting to slowly flip or at the least become neutral
I moved to Florida around the time of the 2016 election, and it’s shocking how much things have changed since then.
When I moved here, Florida was famously the most evenly split state in the country, but had voted Democrat for the two most recent presidential elections (2008 and 2012). The state government, while typically Republican, usually maintained a pretty hands-off / libertarian way of running things. Many cities like Orlando, St Pete, and Key West were nationally famous for their vibrant LGBT communities, and the mix of different cultures in the state gave us a cosmopolitan feel you typically see in more liberal states, likely influenced by all the northerners and immigrant communities that have moved here. So basically Florida felt like a purple, almost liberal oasis in the conservative south, and it felt like anyone was welcome here.
Now DeSantis has a grip on all branches of the state government, and it seems like people here love him. The LGBT communities are being chased out, and many businesses are being told that they can’t operate in ways that are more liberal. The easy-going vibe the state used to have has now disappeared almost completely, since it feels like we are the nation’s number one battleground in the culture war. It’s really upsetting what’s happened here in just a few years.
Not gonna lie, since Trump got elected, Florida has gotten very fuckin weird lmfao. Especially suburban central Florida.