In 2004, I went to the United States to cover the general election, which was my first live contact with the American election. At that time, I first settled in Hawaii, then went to Washington, D.C., Massachusetts, Texas, and finally to California.
When I was in Hawaii, I asked a scholar whether he would vote for Kerry or Bush Jr. He said that he was a Republican supporter and would vote for Bush Jr., but his vote was “certainly useless” because Hawaii is a blue state and the Democrats would definitely win ; In Texas, I asked a reporter the same question, and the answer was that I wanted to vote for Kerry, but “it’s definitely useless” because Texas is a red state with a majority of Republicans.
Blue or red, affects the judgment of everyone in the state. In the presidential election, the typical blue states mainly include California, New York State and several states in Northeast New England, where the Democratic Party basically does not have to worry; the typical red states include Texas, Mississippi and Alabama and other southwestern states , is the Republican vote. There are also some states between red and blue, called swing states, where local elections are usually very fierce.
Generally speaking, ethnic minorities and most highly educated urban residents tend to be more Democratic, which is the basis of blue states; suburban whites and religious whites tend to be Republican, which is the basis of red states; to become a swing state, among voters There must be a considerable number of moderate and independent voters.
But whether red, blue or gray (swing states), is not set in stone. The change of political color has a certain relationship with a state’s population, industry and other factors.
For example, Nevada and Arizona, two states next to California, are typical cases. In the 1970s and 1980s, these two states were red states, but they began to transition to blue from about 2000, especially in Nevada, where Democrats won the presidential election since 2008, and Arizona is also in 2020. Started to turn blue.
In terms of population, both Nevada and Arizona belong to the “Sunshine Belt”. People from other states in the United States are willing to come here, and there are more and more foreign immigrants, of course, most of them are from Mexico. Whether they are domestic immigrants or Mexican-Americans, most of them live in the two major metropolitan areas of Las Vegas (Casino) in Nevada and Phoenix (Phoenix) in Arizona. Most of these new immigrants at home and abroad support the Democratic Party.
In terms of industry, the entertainment service industry in Las Vegas and the high-tech and communication industries in Phoenix are relatively developed, and most practitioners support the Democratic Party. Of course, the military industry in Phoenix is also very important, and most military industry companies support the Republican Party.
Because most of the voters who support the Democratic Party live in the two major metropolitan areas, both Nevada and Arizona have a political map of “urban blue” and “rural red”. Some researchers believe that this trend will continue because of the rapid growth of urban population and the arrival of new high-end industries, such as chip factories invested by TSMC.
The trend is the trend, and the two sides are still evenly matched in the two states. In the just-concluded mid-term elections, Democrats won the Senate elections in both states; in the House of Representatives elections, Nevada Democrats won 3 seats and Republicans won 1 seat, while Arizona Republicans won 6 seats and Democrats won 3 seats. In the gubernatorial election, Arizona was won by a Democrat, defeating Carly Lake, known as “Trump in high heels”, while Nevada was won by a Republican. The elections for the senator and the governor are very thrilling, and the votes for both sides are very close. This is one of the characteristics of swing states.
Regardless of whether a red state or a blue state, candidates of different “colors” are sometimes selected when electing presidents and governors. California is a typical blue state, which can be called dark blue, but there are also Republicans who have served as governors for a long time. For example, Reagan and Schwarzenegger both served two terms.
