The Suburban Nightmare, Continued

Following the early November 2019 off-year elections, this blogger posted an article titled “Whistling Past the Graveyard,” which addressed Matt Bevin’s loss in the Kentucky gubernatorial race in the context of Bevin’s clear similarities with President Donald Trump.  The article also referenced the one remaining major race in the 2019 election cycle, the Louisiana gubernatorial run-off.  That race has now been decided in a close but not razor-thin victory for Democratic Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards.

Bel Edwards’ victory is hardly surprising, as he holds an approval rating of somewhat greater than 50% despite the staunch Republican nature of the Louisiana electorate.  However, Bel Edwards’ matchup with Republican businessman Eddie Risponse saw him overcome stiff headwinds from not one, not two, but three visits to the state by President Donald Trump in the run-up to this vote.  Like Kentucky (where Republicans also suffered a gubernatorial defeat in spite of a favorable partisan lean), the 2016 Trump campaign saw a crushing win in Louisiana, one which will assuredly be replicated next fall.

While the Rispone campaign sought to rely upon Trump’s popularity with the GOP base to best Edwards, the Governor’s own re-election ran through what is quickly becoming a huge obstacle for Trump 2020 – suburbs.  Edwards’ victory was propelled by an extremely strong performance, by historical standards, in the suburbs of New Orleans and Baton Rouge, where like Kentucky (which involved non-descript Republicans retaining high vote shares in the suburbs of Cincinnati and Louisville but the more high profile GOP governor suffering a precipitous fall), certain voters were comfortable voting for a Democrat in a big ticket race and then reverting back to a Republican when less well-known candidates were found on their ballots.  As the chart in the linked tweet reflects, the Congressional Districts including the New Orleans suburbs and the Baton Rouge region both saw significant ticket splitting favorable to the Democrat Edwards and the GOP’s generic, down ballot Secretary of State candidate.

LA RUNOFF TICKET SPLITTING: Now that results are finalized, Governor and Sec of State results (EV incl) are side by side for each CD. There are 3 districts where ticket splitting was >=10%: (1) CD 1 – NO Suburbs, (2) CD 6 – Baton Rouge, and (3) CD 5 – Ralph Abraham's district. pic.twitter.com/pWVGOOJu7m

— John Couvillon (@WinWithJMC) November 27, 2019

While the proof is not and may never be conclusive, there exists a very plausible theory that these ticket splits, mirrored in Kentucky, represent a unique, multi-faceted voting phenomenon currently occurring in suburbs.  Given the opportunity to rebuke Donald Trump, through an acolyte, in a competitive race where the President has weighed in, suburban voters are pulling the Democratic lever.  At the same time, a generic GOP candidate is fine by them, and retains their support.  In effect, there may well be a “disapprove Trump, approve Republicans (or disapprove Democrats more)” caucus in suburbia.

Putting this phenomenon in the context of the 2020 election, while a partly Trump-induced reddening of rural America continues, the trajectory of the GOP in suburbs has taken the opposite track.  Some of this suburban decline is purely demographic, as certain suburbs (e.g., Dallas and Austin) have rapidly diversified, and the GOP simply faces a far more hostile electorate than it did in these locations even a decade ago.  However, a marked decline in 2019 of the GOP vote share in the suburbs of Louisville, Cincinnati (which borders Kentucky to the north), New Orleans, and Baton Rouge cannot be attributed to rapid growth or rapid diversification – these places look awfully similar today to what they looked like in 2008 (or, in the case of all but Baton Rouge, 2000).  In effect, GOP declines in such locales almost certainly result from defections of white middle and upper-middle class voters away from Republicans, at least in certain races.

For Donald Trump to be re-elected, he must avoid a precipitous drop in suburbs across America.  While swing states such as Iowa, Wisconsin, Ohio, North Carolina, and even Georgia may contain enough rural voters to offset further suburban declines, states like Arizona and Pennsylvania probably do not.*  Without at least one of those two states, Donald Trump’s path to re-election is imperiled.

*This blogger is of the opinion that another Trump win in the state of Michigan (almost certainly the most shocking result at any level of the entire 2016 election) will only come in the case of a relatively comfortable Trump re-election, thus rendering Michigan superfluous in a 2020 analysis.

Author’s Note: This is my last politics post of 2019.  I thank all readers for their time, and I will try to keep up my pace of a couple of posts each month throughout 2020.  I am expecting one more blog post this year (possibly even this week), and it will be in the category of sports, a topic on which I have not yet written but am extremely passionate.