fivethirtyeight--2020-12-11--Why A Big Bloc of Americans Is Wary Of The COVID-19 Vaccine — Even As Experts Hope To See Widespread

Why A Big Bloc of Americans Is Wary Of The COVID-19 Vaccine — Even As Experts Hope To See Widespread Immunization

Welcome to Pollapalooza , our weekly polling roundup .
Most Americans say they will take one of the vaccines to immunize themselves from COVID-19 when they become available , according to a series of recent polls .
( And that could be soon , since the Food and Drug Administration ’ s vaccine advisory panel this week recommended that the FDA authorize a vaccine created by Pfizer , likely clearing a path for formal approval and some Americans to be given it as early as next week . )
But at least right now , there are several demographic groups @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , which might lead people in those groups to become ill from the virus at higher rates and prevent the U.S. overall from having the kind of widespread immunization from COVID-19 that medical experts and U.S. government officials would like to see .
What to make of Pfizer ’ s big vaccine announcement l FiveThirtyEight Overall , 60 percent of American adults said that they would “ definitely ” ( 29 percent ) or “ probably ” ( 31 percent ) take a vaccine “ if it were available today , ” according @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Nov. 18-29 .
Eighteen percent said that they would “ definitely not ” take the vaccine , and 21 percent said that they would “ probably not.
” Other polls have revealed similar findings ( for the most part ) .
A Morning Consult survey on behalf of National Geographic conducted Nov. 20-23 found 61 percent of Americans were either “ likely ” or “ somewhat likely ” to take a vaccine if it were approved by the FDA and made available to them .
In that poll , 30 percent said they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ including 19 percent who indicated they were “ very unlikely.
” And a Gallup poll conducted Nov. 16-29 showed roughly the same splits .
[ Related : How To Make Sure People Come Back For Their Second COVID-19 Vaccine Dose ] These surveys show some clear demographic divides around being vaccinated for COVID-19 .
Here are Pew ’ s results , for example : Let ’ s look more closely at those differences ( note that these groups are in alphabetical order ) : Age .
Willingness to take a vaccine generally increases @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 65 in particular willing to take it , according to the surveys .
The Morning Consult poll found 68 percent of those who are over age 65 said they would take the vaccine , compared to 54 percent ages 18-34 .
It is not surprising that older people would be more eager to be vaccinated for COVID-19 compared to younger ones , since people over age 65 are dying at higher rates from the virus than younger people .
Education .
Willingness to take a vaccine generally goes up with education levels too @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 68 percent of people with a college degree said they would take a vaccine , compared to 61 percent without a degree .
Pew found a larger gap between people with postgraduate degrees ( 75 percent would take a vaccine ) compared to those with only a high school education ( 55 percent ) .
It could be that people with higher levels of education are more aware of the importance of taking vaccines to prevent the spread of diseases and/or are more confident the vaccine will both immunize them and not result @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this education finding could just be a proxy for partisanship ( more on that in a bit ) , since people with college degrees and postgraduate degrees tend to be more Democratic-leaning than those without degrees .
Gender .
Men are notably more willing than women to say that they will take the vaccine , according to these surveys .
For example , 67 percent of men but just 54 percent of women said they would take the vaccine , per Pew .
There is not an obvious explanation for this finding , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ four of these polls but surveys done recently of people in Colorado , North Carolina and even Ireland .
In fact , this finding contradicts the general trend in American health — women generally take more preventative measures than men .
For example , women tend to be more likely than men to get flu vaccinations and men are more likely than women to go a year or more without seeing a doctor .
[ Related : Why So Many Men Stuck With Trump In 2020 ] One potential explanation : women are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pro-health measure , because they aren ’ t sure that the vaccines are safe .
In the Elon University survey of North Carolina residents , women who said they would not take a COVID-19 vaccine suggested that the vaccine approval process had happened too quickly , leaving them worried that the vaccine process was politicized and that there might be side effects that are not being publicized or aren ’ t yet known .
“ Women are already well-represented in the anti-vaccination movement and in wellness blogging communities that advocate for “ natural @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kelly McGuire , a professor of gender at Ontario-based Trent University .
She added , “ There are also numerous studies indicating that women may be conditioned to be more risk-averse than men , which could be informing response to a vaccine that was developed much more quickly than most people anticipated.
” Partisanship .
Democrats are more willing than Republicans to be vaccinated , per the surveys .
For example , 75 percent of Democrats said they would take the vaccine in the Gallup poll , compared to 50 percent of Republicans @ @ @ @ @ @ @ There are not a lot of prominent politicians who are publicly skeptical of vaccines , but those ranks are dominated by conservatives .
Even before the coronavirus outbreak , rank-and-file Republicans tended to be more wary of mandatory vaccinations for children for illnesses like the measles .
And amid the COVID-19 outbreak specifically , those Republicans have expressed less concern about the spread of the virus compared to Democrats and are less likely to wear masks .
Race .
Black people are notably less likely than other racial and ethnic groups to say @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vaccine , according to these surveys .
For example , per the Pew survey , 83 percent of Asian Americans , 63 percent of Hispanics , 61 percent of non-Hispanic white Americans and just 42 percent of Black Americans indicated they would take a vaccine .
Black Americans are very Democratic leaning but also less likely than Asian or white Americans to have college degrees .
So those two factors may not be good explanations for the wariness of Black Americans in particular about the vaccine .
Instead , experts say there is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ health care research and lingering suspicion from that mistreatment about how the American health care system treats them .
The most prominent example of this mistreatment is the Tuskegee study , in which a group of Black men , many of whom had syphilis , were denied treatment that would have lessened the effects of the disease because researchers at Tuskegee wanted to secretly study how the men dealt with the illness .
The study ran from the 1930s to the 1970s before its details became public and it was shut down .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ vaccine is a major potential problem for the U.S .
Some government officials are suggesting that the U.S. could eventually achieve “ herd immunity ” — a condition in which enough people have had the vaccine that the virus can ’ t spread rapidly through a geographic area .
That would involve at least 60 percent of people ( if not more ) taking a vaccine .
We should be hesitant about these notions of herd immunity , as it ’ s not clear if the vaccines prevent people from transmitting the virus @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from getting a severe case of COVID-19 .
That said , there is general agreement that the higher the rate of COVID-19 vaccination , the better .
And the numbers of Americans willing to take a vaccine might go up .
In the next few weeks and months , we are likely to see more and more people being vaccinated and not having major side effects .
Thousands of American health care workers and elderly people — and potentially millions of others — will likely receive a COVID-19 vaccine by the end of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Clinton and Obama have all indicated that they will take a vaccine as soon as they are allowed to and would be willing to do so in public .
It is hard to imagine in this scenario that the number of Americans who say they are willing to get a vaccine ( and ultimately do ) doesn ’ t go up , even among vaccine-wary demographic groups .
[ Related : How To Trust That A COVID-19 Vaccine Is Safe ] Also , we are likely to see targeted efforts at specific demographic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ encourage them to take a COVID-19 vaccine , which might also increase their enthusiasm about the idea .
Conversely , if say , thousands of people get really sick from the vaccine ( this is not likely , I am raising a worst-case scenario ) or people take the vaccine but still get really bad cases of COVID-19 say a month later ( also unlikely ) that might drive even more people to say that they are not willing to take it .
Bottom line — take these COVID-19 poll numbers seriously and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is not great that 40 percent of Americans , including huge blocs of Black people , Republicans and women , seem wary of taking a vaccine right now .
And it ’ s possible those numbers go down , but seems more likely that they go up as Americans watch news coverage describing how millions of people took a COVID-19 vaccine and not have any major health incidents as a result .
• About 82 percent of Americans agree with the Center for Diseases Control ’ s guidance that health care workers and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vaccines before other Americans , according to a YouGov poll conducted Dec 2-3 .
• Just 29 percent of Americans think that prison inmates should be prioritized for getting COVID-19 vaccines , according to a YouGov poll conducted on Dec. 7 , even as prisons are one of the places where virus outbreaks often occur .
Another 45 percent of Americans oppose this idea , 26 percent said they didn ’ t know their view on the subject .
• Black people are much more likely than other groups to say they “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ concerns ” with other Black people , according to a recent poll conducted by HuffPost and YouGov .
In the survey , 52 percent of Black people indicated they have commonalities with other Black Americans , compared to 29 percent of Black people indicating that “ race and ethnicity are not really that relevant , ” and 19 percent saying they were not sure .
Just 36 percent of Hispanics and 17 percent of white people indicated they have a lot of commonality with people who they share their race or ethnicity .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ that suggests Black Americans in particular view themselves as having “ shared fate ” with one another .
• According to that same survey , Americans tend not to say they have a lot of common concerns with people who share their gender , income level , age , religion or live in the same area .
But more than half of Democrats , Republicans , white people , Black people , men and women say they have a lot of commonality with people who are in the same political party that they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ big fault lines among Georgia voters in the two U.S. Senate races there .
In his race against Democrat Jon Ossoff , incumbent GOP Sen. David Perdue leads 71-26 percent among Georgia ’ s white voters , according to a Data for Progress poll released this week .
Among Georgia Black voters , Ossoff is ahead 89-9 .
Among voters over 45 , Perdue leads 56-41 .
Among voters under 45 , Ossoff leads 57-40 .
• In the other Senate race in Georgia , incumbent Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler leads her Democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ voters and 54-44 among those over 45 .
Warnock is ahead 89-7 among Black voters and 58-36 among those under 45 .
Overall , the DFP survey showed both races effectively tied ( Warnock ahead 50-47 over Loeffler , Perdue ahead 50-48 over Ossoff . )
FiveThirtyEight is doing a regularly updated polling average of polls in Georgia , which you can see here .
• Sixty-six percent of Americans , including 51 percent of Republicans , said they supported a recent U.S. House vote to decriminalize marijuana , compared to just 25 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Politico/Morning Consult poll conducted Dec 4-6 .
According to FiveThirtyEight ’ s presidential approval tracker , 43.3 percent of Americans approve of the job President Trump is doing , while 52.5 percent disapprove ( a net approval rating of -9.2 points ) .
At this time last week , 43.6 percent approved and 52.8 percent disapproved ( a net approval rating of -9.2 points ) .
One month ago , Trump had an approval rating of 44.8 percent and a disapproval rating of 52.0 percent , for a net approval rating of -7.3 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ compare to other presidents | FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast


fivethirtyeight--2020-12-14--Warnock And Ossoff Are Testing A New Strategy For Democrats In The South

For most of the past four years , the Midwest occupied the leading spot on the marquee of U.S. electoral politics .
Voters there helped tip the Electoral College toward Donald Trump in 2016 , as he eked out victories in Michigan , Pennsylvania and Wisconsin .
And rebuilding the so-called blue wall was in part why Democrats chose an older , white , relatively moderate man as their presidential nominee in 2020 .
That strategy worked .
Joe Biden narrowly carried all three states , providing him the Electoral College margins to win the presidency .
But now a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for top billing : the South .
It ’ s almost impossible to overstate the importance of Georgia ’ s two U.S. Senate runoff elections on Jan. 5 , which feature Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler facing Democrat Raphael Warnock in one race and Republican Sen. David Perdue versus Democrat Jon Ossoff in the other .
If Democrats win both races , they would effectively control the Senate , giving the party a governing trifecta in Washington .
Georgia , though , is a much different place than the Midwest .
That ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ differences lead to important distinctions in what we can expect from campaigns there .
What makes Georgia electorally unlike most swing states is its large Black population .
About 33 percent of Georgians are Black , a much higher share than the nation overall ( 13 percent ) and higher than all but two other states ( Mississippi and Louisiana ) .
To be more precise , what ’ s really different about Georgia ’ s electoral politics is that Democrats there are disproportionately Black .
Like in most states , Republican voters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ nationally — even in the Democratic Party — non-Hispanic white people are by far the biggest bloc .
We don ’ t ( and will never ) have exact figures for this , but nationally in 2020 , it ’ s likely that more than 60 percent of Biden voters were white and fewer than 20 percent were Black .
But in Georgia , there were very likely more Black Biden supporters than white ones — in fact , Black voters may have been an outright majority of his supporters .
A large @ @ @ @ @ @ @ base in Georgia is Black , and they have a huge influence on the campaigns to win these two Senate races , including in ways the party has little control over .
That ’ s been especially true recently , as the region has grown more racially diverse and suburban .
And we are likely to see more Black-centered campaigns in Southern states in the future , particularly if Warnock or Ossoff ( or both ) wins .
A potential new model for Democratic campaigns in the South Warnock and Ossoff are somewhat @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the South and get strong backing from the Democratic Party — Warnock is Black , Ossoff is a fairly liberal Jewish 33-year-old .
For much of the past four decades , as the Republican Party has increasingly gained strength in the South , the Democratic Party has employed a two-pronged strategy to try to limit its losses : take more conservative stands than the national Democratic Party on some policies and embrace white candidates , usually men , in key statewide races .
That strategy didn ’ t really work overall , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was wrong either — there was probably not any way to prevent the South from shifting Republican over the past several decades .
And in some specific cases that strategy has worked .
Currently , the three Democratic governors in Southern states that are red or purple politically are all white men : Kentucky ’ s Andy Beshear , North Carolina ’ s Roy Cooper and Louisiana ’ s Jon Bel Edwards .
As are the only two senators , Alabama ’ s Doug Jones and West Virginia ’ s Joe Manchin .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ conservative Democrats .
In Georgia , Biden outperformed Warnock and Ossoff , and that might have been because Biden is an older white man who is often cast in the media as more conservative than other Democrats .
That strategy also has downsides , though .
It steers the party toward candidates who sometimes don ’ t share the views of the party ’ s base on key issues — Edwards is opposed to abortion rights , for example — and away from candidates who are people of color .
Stacey Abrams had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ growing number of voters of color in the South and the region ’ s liberalism on some issues .
Not only is she a Black woman , of course , but her own 2018 gubernatorial campaign was a decided break from this strategy , as it emphasized outreach to people of color and didn ’ t tack to the right on key issues .
Her strong showing suggested Democrats in statewide races could be competitive in the South without going the conservative-ish-white-guy route .
The 2020 election results reinforce that conclusion to some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Mississippi ( Mike Espy ) and South Carolina ( Jaime Harrison ) lost by substantial margins , but Biden lost in those states by even more , suggesting those Black candidates didn ’ t suffer from a major racial backlash .
Warnock and the other Democrats in his Senate race combined won 48.4 percent of the total vote , and Ossoff won 47.9 percent ; Biden won 49.5 percent in Georgia .
Also , Jones , who is fairly old ( 66 ) and not that liberal , was blown away in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ results aren ’ t too surprising .
The Democratic Party that has emerged from the Obama-Trump era is a multiracial coalition of people with generally more progressive attitudes about racial issues .
The GOP is a mostly white coalition of people who tend to have less progressive attitudes about racial issues .
And more and more Americans are voting by party instead of ticket splitting .
So , in most races , Democrats aren ’ t going to win a lot of votes from conservative-leaning white people , particularly in the South , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ man who is somewhat conservative .
And they are going to win the votes of white people with more progressive attitudes on racial issues , even if the candidate is not a white Christian older man .
Those conditions help explain how Warnock and Ossoff — who are unlike most previous Democratic candidates in Georgia — ended up at the center of U.S. politics .
Ossoff won the Democratic primary for the Perdue seat in June in part because he had built a big following and fundraising network from his unsuccessful 2017 run @ @ @ @ @ @ @ got a lot of national attention .
But the more interesting story is how Ossoff won the Democratic primary in 2017 , when several other Democrats also sought the seat in Georgia ’ s 6th District in the suburbs of Atlanta .
After all , Ossoff wasn ’ t exactly an obvious candidate — a lawyer or doctor or someone who had served in office before — at the time .
Only 30 years old , he was running a documentary film company and didn ’ t actually live within the district ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ neighboring district closer to where his now-wife worked ) .
The explanation for how Ossoff won is pretty simple .
In his initial House run , Ossoff got the enthusiastic support of two Atlanta-area congressmen , Hank Johnson and , more significantly , John Lewis .
Ossoff had interned in Lewis ’ s congressional office and then worked on Johnson ’ s campaign and in his D.C. office .
It ’ s fairly unusual for a white man to work in the congressional offices of two Black House members and use that as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ career .
But the top ranks of elected officials in the Atlanta area are made up largely of Black Democrats and white Republicans — so it was entirely logical that someone like Ossoff , a politically inclined white Democrat who grew up in the Atlanta area , would end up working for Black politicians .
And with the Atlanta area growing increasingly diverse and its white voters likely becoming more liberal on racial issues after Trump ’ s election , Ossoff ’ s associations with two Black members of Congress were great credentials @ @ @ @ @ @ @ later run for the Senate .
Atlanta ’ s Black political class in some ways accidentally birthed Ossoff as a U.S. Senate candidate .
“ When he [ Ossoff ] announced his Senate campaign last year , his first major rally was with none other than John Lewis .
The congressman told me afterward he would do everything he could to help energize Black voters for Ossoff , ” said Greg Bluestein , a political reporter at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution .
Warnock is more obviously rooted in Atlanta ’ s Black scene .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ has served for 15 years as the senior pastor of Ebenezer , the 6,000-member Baptist church that was led by Martin Luther King Sr. for decades , with Martin Luther King Jr. serving as a co-pastor from 1960 until he was assassinated in 1968 .
Politicians , including some Republicans , have long visited the church as part of their outreach to Black voters .
And even before becoming a candidate , Warnock had been politically engaged himself , leading a protest at the state ’ s capitol in an effort to get @ @ @ @ @ @ @ flirted with a U.S. Senate run back in 2016 .
But Warnock ’ s decision to run for the Senate this year wasn ’ t just about his own political ambitions — the Democratic Party really wanted him to run , in part because of his race .
There was some grumbling among Georgia Democrats in 2019 that Ossoff and most of the other leading contenders in the Democratic primary for Perdue ’ s seat were white .
So , last fall , when then-Sen. Johnny Isakson , a Republican , announced his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Senate election in 2020 , Democratic leaders in Washington , as well as Abrams , strongly encouraged Warnock to run .
Warnock formally announced his candidacy in January .
He was not the only Democratic candidate who ran for the seat vacated by Isakson , which Gov .
Brain Kemp appointed Leoffler to fill .
But the Democratic Party did everything it could to make sure that Warnock — not his Democratic rival Matt Lieberman , who is white and the son of the former longtime Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman — was the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The Democrats ’ Senate campaign arm , along with Sen. Cory Booker and Abrams , endorsed Warnock right at the start of his campaign , and other party officials , mostly notably former President Obama , also got behind him .
In the November election — which included more than a dozen candidates overall ( and several from both parties because of the special election rules triggered by Isakson ’ s resignation ) — Warnock ended up getting about 33 percent of the vote , while Lieberman got just under 3 percent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ slate in Georgia .
But we ’ ve also seen some subtle differences compared with past Democratic candidates in how Warnock and Ossoff have campaigned after making it to the runoffs .
Connecting to Black voters in ways that don ’ t annoy white voters Neither Ossoff nor Warnock is saying anything particularly bold on racial issues to appeal to Black voters .
That ’ s not surprising .
Ossoff and Warnock can ’ t take a stand on any issue , racial or nonracial , that is likely to alienate a lot @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Democratic campaign needs to win around 30 percent of white voters in Georgia to carry the state — and that ’ s often where they fall short .
Biden ran slightly ahead of both Ossoff and the combined total of Warnock and all the other Democrats in the other Senate race , suggesting that there may be some white moderates or independents who couldn ’ t stomach Trump but were fine with backing a Republican for Senate .
Democrats need those voters to either stay home on Election Day or flip to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reparations , which are popular among Black voters , are off the table , as they would likely not appeal to white swing voters in Georgia .
Instead , Ossoff and Warnock ’ s approach is similar to Abrams ’ s campaign in 2018 , when she ran for governor : a lot of focus on showing connectedness to Georgia ’ s Black community , but not a ton of policy , particularly on more controversial issues specifically aimed at Black people .
Both Senate candidates frequently tout their connections to the civil @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Lewis for Ossoff , King for Warnock ) .
Both candidates are prominently featuring Obama in their campaigns — the former president praised Ossoff in a new TV commercial and appeared in a recent virtual rally for Ossoff and Warnock .
And both men emphasize their support for the John Lewis Voting Rights Act , a measure that would essentially restore requirements that some states pre-clear with the U.S. Justice Department any changes in their voting procedures .
Ossoff , as the white candidate who needs a lot of Black support , regularly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Democrats .
( “ Black voters are the heart and soul of the Democratic electorate here in Georgia , ” he told Yahoo News in a recent interview . )
Warnock emphasizes parts of his upbringing likely to resonate with Black people in particular : his mother picking tobacco and cotton when she was young ; his family living in public housing when he was a kid ; his college days at Morehouse , which he paid for in part with Pell Grants .
The pastor also has a commercial in which he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ store as a 12-year-old because the workers there thought he had stolen something — they were suspicious because Warnock is Black and had his hands in his pockets .
“ Warnock and Ossoff back stances that are largely popular with Black voters — including Medicaid expansion , decriminalizing marijuana and tackling student debt — that would also level the playing field some in terms of systemic inequality , ” said Terrence Clark , Warnoff ’ s communications director .
Clark noted that both candidates speak openly and directly about how that inequality hurts @ @ @ @ @ @ @ worried about a backlash from this kind of racialized rhetoric .
In Clark ’ s view , white voters in Georgia and across the country have “ largely moved toward the left on social issues , so the electorate is not as sharply divided on issues that historically animate Black voters.
” And even as they take rather safe positions on racial issues , Ossoff and Warnock aren ’ t likely to join leading Democratic Party figures like Obama who are criticizing activists adopting more controversial stands like defunding the police .
Why @ @ @ @ @ @ @ strong turnout and support from all parts of the Black community , including younger Black people who might agree with more leftish positions .
And Black Lives Matter and other left-leaning activist groups are on the ground in Georgia , trying to help the Democrats win there .
So Ossoff and Warnock have little incentive to antagonize them .
“ The idea that Black candidates can ’ t do as well as white candidates in the South has been untrue for years , and the operatives and politicians that push that narrative are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ won sh– in the last 25 years , ” said Trey Nix , a Democratic political strategist who often works on races in the South , including Cooper ’ s last two gubernatorial campaigns in North Carolina .
“ Part of the future of winning in the South for Democrats is in candidates like Warnock and Abrams , ” Nix added .
Maybe .
If Ossoff , Warnock or both do fairly poorly ( finishing at , say , 45 percent or below ) , then perhaps the recent blue shift in Georgia @ @ @ @ @ @ @ need Biden types in states like Georgia to be competitive now that the Trump era is likely over .
But as long as Ossoff and Warnock do decently well — getting at least 46 to 49 percent of the vote or winning — I suspect we are going to see more young , non-Christian , women and/or people of color as Democratic candidates in key races in the South ( as opposed to just older centrist white men ) .
In fact , soon after these Senate races are over , Georgia is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ statewide and playing up her ties to the Black community : Abrams , who is expected to launch a second campaign for governor sometime in 2021 .
I doubt we have seen the last of Biden-Edwards-Jones-style candidates in the South .
But what Abrams has dubbed the “ Abrams playbook ” for Democrats in Georgia in particular — trying to win a coalition of progressive white voters and people of color with candidates and strategies that connect with those two blocs — may eventually be the default Democratic Party playbook for the South @ @ @ @ @ @ @ health , jobs , and justice , ” Ossoff said in a recent Twitter message , sounding like a civil rights activist as much as a politician .
He added , “ @ ReverendWarnock and I are building a multiracial , multi generational coalition : The New South .
”

Perry Bacon Jr. (perry.bacon@fivethirtyeight.com)

For most of the past four years, the Midwest occupied the leading spot on the marquee of U.S. electoral politics. Voters there helped tip the Electoral College toward Donald Trump in 2016, as he eked out victories in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. And rebuilding the so-called blue wall was in part why Democrats chose an older, white, relatively moderate man as their presidential nominee in 2020. That strategy worked. Joe Biden narrowly carried all three states, providing him the Electoral College margins to win the presidency.
But now a new star has elbowed out the Midwest for top billing: the South. It’s almost impossible to overstate the importance of Georgia’s two U.S. Senate runoff elections on Jan. 5, which feature Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler facing Democrat Raphael Warnock in one race and Republican Sen. David Perdue versus Democrat Jon Ossoff in the other. If Democrats win both races, they would effectively control the Senate, giving the party a governing trifecta in Washington.
The electoral problems facing Republicans | FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast
Georgia, though, is a much different place than the Midwest. That’s obvious, of course, but those differences lead to important distinctions in what we can expect from campaigns there. What makes Georgia electorally unlike most swing states is its large Black population. About 33 percent of Georgians are Black, a much higher share than the nation overall (13 percent) and higher than all but two other states (Mississippi and Louisiana).
[Related: Latest Polls Of The Georgia Senate Runoff Elections]
To be more precise, what’s really different about Georgia’s electoral politics is that Democrats there are disproportionately Black. Like in most states, Republican voters in Georgia are overwhelmingly white. And nationally — even in the Democratic Party — non-Hispanic white people are by far the biggest bloc. We don’t (and will never) have exact figures for this, but nationally in 2020, it’s likely that more than 60 percent of Biden voters were white and fewer than 20 percent were Black. But in Georgia, there were very likely more Black Biden supporters than white ones — in fact, Black voters may have been an outright majority of his supporters.
A large share of the Democratic Party’s base in Georgia is Black, and they have a huge influence on the campaigns to win these two Senate races, including in ways the party has little control over. That’s been especially true recently, as the region has grown more racially diverse and suburban. And we are likely to see more Black-centered campaigns in Southern states in the future, particularly if Warnock or Ossoff (or both) wins.
A potential new model for Democratic campaigns in the South
Warnock and Ossoff are somewhat unusual candidates to run for statewide office in the South and get strong backing from the Democratic Party — Warnock is Black, Ossoff is a fairly liberal Jewish 33-year-old. For much of the past four decades, as the Republican Party has increasingly gained strength in the South, the Democratic Party has employed a two-pronged strategy to try to limit its losses: take more conservative stands than the national Democratic Party on some policies and embrace white candidates, usually men, in key statewide races. That strategy didn’t really work overall, but it’s not clear it was wrong either — there was probably not any way to prevent the South from shifting Republican over the past several decades.
And in some specific cases that strategy has worked. Currently, the three Democratic governors in Southern states that are red or purple politically are all white men: Kentucky’s Andy Beshear, North Carolina’s Roy Cooper and Louisiana’s Jon Bel Edwards. As are the only two senators, Alabama’s Doug Jones and West Virginia’s Joe Manchin. Edwards and Manchin in particular are fairly conservative Democrats. In Georgia, Biden outperformed Warnock and Ossoff, and that might have been because Biden is an older white man who is often cast in the media as more conservative than other Democrats.
That strategy also has downsides, though. It steers the party toward candidates who sometimes don’t share the views of the party’s base on key issues — Edwards is opposed to abortion rights, for example — and away from candidates who are people of color.
Stacey Abrams had long criticized that approach as ignoring the growing number of voters of color in the South and the region’s liberalism on some issues. Not only is she a Black woman, of course, but her own 2018 gubernatorial campaign was a decided break from this strategy, as it emphasized outreach to people of color and didn’t tack to the right on key issues. Her strong showing suggested Democrats in statewide races could be competitive in the South without going the conservative-ish-white-guy route.
The 2020 election results reinforce that conclusion to some extent. Black male Democratic Senate candidates in Mississippi (Mike Espy) and South Carolina (Jaime Harrison) lost by substantial margins, but Biden lost in those states by even more, suggesting those Black candidates didn’t suffer from a major racial backlash. Warnock and the other Democrats in his Senate race combined won 48.4 percent of the total vote, and Ossoff won 47.9 percent; Biden won 49.5 percent in Georgia.
Also, Jones, who is fairly old (66) and not that liberal, was blown away in his reelection bid in Alabama.
Those results aren’t too surprising. The Democratic Party that has emerged from the Obama-Trump era is a multiracial coalition of people with generally more progressive attitudes about racial issues. The GOP is a mostly white coalition of people who tend to have less progressive attitudes about racial issues. And more and more Americans are voting by party instead of ticket splitting.
[Related: Politics Podcast: The Electoral Challenges Facing The Republican Party]
So, in most races, Democrats aren’t going to win a lot of votes from conservative-leaning white people, particularly in the South, even if they run an older white man who is somewhat conservative. And they are going to win the votes of white people with more progressive attitudes on racial issues, even if the candidate is not a white Christian older man.
Those conditions help explain how Warnock and Ossoff — who are unlike most previous Democratic candidates in Georgia — ended up at the center of U.S. politics.
Two candidates tied to Atlanta’s Black political class
Ossoff won the Democratic primary for the Perdue seat in June in part because he had built a big following and fundraising network from his unsuccessful 2017 run in a U.S. House special election that got a lot of national attention. But the more interesting story is how Ossoff won the Democratic primary in 2017, when several other Democrats also sought the seat in Georgia’s 6th District in the suburbs of Atlanta. After all, Ossoff wasn’t exactly an obvious candidate — a lawyer or doctor or someone who had served in office before — at the time. Only 30 years old, he was running a documentary film company and didn’t actually live within the district’s borders (he lived in a neighboring district closer to where his now-wife worked).
The explanation for how Ossoff won is pretty simple. In his initial House run, Ossoff got the enthusiastic support of two Atlanta-area congressmen, Hank Johnson and, more significantly, John Lewis. Ossoff had interned in Lewis’s congressional office and then worked on Johnson’s campaign and in his D.C. office. It’s fairly unusual for a white man to work in the congressional offices of two Black House members and use that as a launching pad for his own political career. But the top ranks of elected officials in the Atlanta area are made up largely of Black Democrats and white Republicans — so it was entirely logical that someone like Ossoff, a politically inclined white Democrat who grew up in the Atlanta area, would end up working for Black politicians. And with the Atlanta area growing increasingly diverse and its white voters likely becoming more liberal on racial issues after Trump’s election, Ossoff’s associations with two Black members of Congress were great credentials for his 2017 House campaign and to later run for the Senate. Atlanta’s Black political class in some ways accidentally birthed Ossoff as a U.S. Senate candidate.
Why did down-ballot Democrats have such a mediocre showing?
“When he [Ossoff] announced his Senate campaign last year, his first major rally was with none other than John Lewis. The congressman told me afterward he would do everything he could to help energize Black voters for Ossoff,” said Greg Bluestein, a political reporter at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Warnock is more obviously rooted in Atlanta’s Black scene. He is Black himself. And he has served for 15 years as the senior pastor of Ebenezer, the 6,000-member Baptist church that was led by Martin Luther King Sr. for decades, with Martin Luther King Jr. serving as a co-pastor from 1960 until he was assassinated in 1968. Politicians, including some Republicans, have long visited the church as part of their outreach to Black voters. And even before becoming a candidate, Warnock had been politically engaged himself, leading a protest at the state’s capitol in an effort to get Medicaid expanded in Georgia; he even flirted with a U.S. Senate run back in 2016.
But Warnock’s decision to run for the Senate this year wasn’t just about his own political ambitions — the Democratic Party really wanted him to run, in part because of his race. There was some grumbling among Georgia Democrats in 2019 that Ossoff and most of the other leading contenders in the Democratic primary for Perdue’s seat were white. So, last fall, when then-Sen. Johnny Isakson, a Republican, announced his retirement, setting up a second Georgia Senate election in 2020, Democratic leaders in Washington, as well as Abrams, strongly encouraged Warnock to run.
[Related: Where Are Georgia’s Senate Candidates Getting All That Cash From?]
Warnock formally announced his candidacy in January. He was not the only Democratic candidate who ran for the seat vacated by Isakson, which Gov. Brian Kemp appointed Loeffler to fill. But the Democratic Party did everything it could to make sure that Warnock — not his Democratic rival Matt Lieberman, who is white and the son of the former longtime Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman — was the Democratic candidate to advance to the runoff. The Democrats’ Senate campaign arm, along with Sen. Cory Booker and Abrams, endorsed Warnock right at the start of his campaign, and other party officials, mostly notably former President Obama, also got behind him. In the November election — which included more than a dozen candidates overall (and several from both parties because of the special election rules triggered by Isakson’s resignation) — Warnock ended up getting about 33 percent of the vote, while Lieberman got just under 3 percent.
So the Democrats avoided an all-white slate in Georgia. But we’ve also seen some subtle differences compared with past Democratic candidates in how Warnock and Ossoff have campaigned after making it to the runoffs.
Connecting to Black voters in ways that don’t annoy white voters
Neither Ossoff nor Warnock is saying anything particularly bold on racial issues to appeal to Black voters. That’s not surprising. Ossoff and Warnock can’t take a stand on any issue, racial or nonracial, that is likely to alienate a lot of white voters in Georgia. A Democratic campaign needs to win around 30 percent of white voters in Georgia to carry the state — and that’s often where they fall short. Biden ran slightly ahead of both Ossoff and the combined total of Warnock and all the other Democrats in the other Senate race, suggesting that there may be some white moderates or independents who couldn’t stomach Trump but were fine with backing a Republican for Senate. Democrats need those voters to either stay home on Election Day or flip to the Democratic Party. So racial ideas like reparations, which are popular among Black voters, are off the table, as they would likely not appeal to white swing voters in Georgia.
Instead, Ossoff and Warnock’s approach is similar to Abrams’s campaign in 2018, when she ran for governor: a lot of focus on showing connectedness to Georgia’s Black community, but not a ton of policy, particularly on more controversial issues specifically aimed at Black people. Both Senate candidates frequently tout their connections to the civil rights-era hero they are associated with (Lewis for Ossoff, King for Warnock). Both candidates are prominently featuring Obama in their campaigns — the former president praised Ossoff in a new TV commercial and appeared in a recent virtual rally for Ossoff and Warnock. And both men emphasize their support for the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, a measure that would essentially restore requirements that some states pre-clear with the U.S. Justice Department any changes in their voting procedures.
Ossoff, as the white candidate who needs a lot of Black support, regularly pays homage to Georgia’s Black Democrats. (“Black voters are the heart and soul of the Democratic electorate here in Georgia,” he told Yahoo News in a recent interview.) Warnock emphasizes parts of his upbringing likely to resonate with Black people in particular: his mother picking tobacco and cotton when she was young; his family living in public housing when he was a kid; his college days at Morehouse, which he paid for in part with Pell Grants. The pastor also has a commercial in which he talks about being dragged out of a store as a 12-year-old because the workers there thought he had stolen something — they were suspicious because Warnock is Black and had his hands in his pockets.
[Why So Many Men Stuck With Trump In 2020]
“Warnock and Ossoff back stances that are largely popular with Black voters — including Medicaid expansion, decriminalizing marijuana and tackling student debt — that would also level the playing field some in terms of systemic inequality,” said Terrence Clark, Warnock’s communications director. Clark noted that both candidates speak openly and directly about how that inequality hurts Black people especially and aren’t worried about a backlash from this kind of racialized rhetoric. In Clark’s view, white voters in Georgia and across the country have “largely moved toward the left on social issues, so the electorate is not as sharply divided on issues that historically animate Black voters.”
And even as they take rather safe positions on racial issues, Ossoff and Warnock aren’t likely to join leading Democratic Party figures like Obama who are criticizing activists adopting more controversial stands like defunding the police. Why not? Because Ossoff and Warnock need strong turnout and support from all parts of the Black community, including younger Black people who might agree with more leftish positions. And Black Lives Matter and other left-leaning activist groups are on the ground in Georgia, trying to help the Democrats win there. So Ossoff and Warnock have little incentive to antagonize them.
“The idea that Black candidates can’t do as well as white candidates in the South has been untrue for years, and the operatives and politicians that push that narrative are generally speaking people who haven’t won sh– in the last 25 years,” said Trey Nix, a Democratic political strategist who often works on races in the South, including Cooper’s last two gubernatorial campaigns in North Carolina.
“Part of the future of winning in the South for Democrats is in candidates like Warnock and Abrams,” Nix added.
Maybe. If Ossoff, Warnock or both do fairly poorly (finishing at, say, 45 percent or below), then perhaps the recent blue shift in Georgia was really just anti-Trump sentiment and Democrats need Biden types in states like Georgia to be competitive now that the Trump era is likely over.
But as long as Ossoff and Warnock do decently well — getting at least 46 to 49 percent of the vote or winning — I suspect we are going to see more young, non-Christian, women and/or people of color as Democratic candidates in key races in the South (as opposed to just older centrist white men). In fact, soon after these Senate races are over, Georgia is likely to have another Democratic candidate running statewide and playing up her ties to the Black community: Abrams, who is expected to launch a second campaign for governor sometime in 2021.
I doubt we have seen the last of Biden-Edwards-Jones-style candidates in the South. But what Abrams has dubbed the “Abrams playbook” for Democrats in Georgia in particular — trying to win a coalition of progressive white voters and people of color with candidates and strategies that connect with those two blocs — may eventually be the default Democratic Party playbook for the South.
“This is a movement for health, jobs, and justice,” Ossoff said in a recent Twitter message, sounding like a civil rights activist as much as a politician.
He added, “@ReverendWarnock and I are building a multiracial, multi generational coalition: The New South.”
Don’t believe anything 2020 exit polls tell you | FiveThirtyEight


fivethirtyeight--2020-12-14--Politics Podcast: Why Republicans Still Doubt The Election Results

The two biggest stories of 2020 in the U.S. — the pandemic and the election — are finding some closure @ @ @ @ @ really just entering its next phase .
The conflicts and challenges presented by both the @ @ @ @ @ s attempts to overturn the election results are not over .
In this installment of @ @ @ @ @ the crew discusses how we got to this moment and what comes next .
You @ @ @ @ @ by clicking the “ play ” button in the audio player above or by downloading @ @ @ @ @ ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform .
If you are new to podcasts , @ @ @ @ @ The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays .
Help new listeners discover the @ @ @ @ @ rating and review on iTunes .
Have a comment , question or suggestion for “ @ @ @ @ @ ” ?
Get in touch by email , on Twitter or in the comments .

The two biggest stories of 2020 in the U.S. — the pandemic and the election — are finding some closure today, though each is really just entering its next phase. The conflicts and challenges presented by both the pandemic and President Trump’s attempts to overturn the election results are not over. In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast, the crew discusses how we got to this moment and what comes next.
You can listen to the episode by clicking the “play” button in the audio player above or by downloading it in iTunes, the ESPN App or your favorite podcast platform. If you are new to podcasts, learn how to listen.
The FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast is recorded Mondays and Thursdays. Help new listeners discover the show by leaving us a rating and review on iTunes. Have a comment, question or suggestion for “good polling vs. bad polling”? Get in touch by email, on Twitter or in the comments.


fivethirtyeight--2020-12-15--Raphael Warnock’s Dog Ads Cut Against White Voters’ Stereotypes Of Black People

If he wins next month , Raphael Warnock may have his pet beagle to thank .
So far , Warnock , the Democratic candidate in one of Georgia ’ s two Senate runoff elections , has aired two ads featuring his dog .
In the first , he uses his cuddly canine to preempt negative GOP attacks against him — attacks that have tried to paint him as an ideological extremist and tie him to far-left Black activists .
In the second ad , the pooch plays an even more prominent role , with Warnock walking his dog through a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , while denouncing Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler ’ s “ smear ads ” against him .
“ I think Georgians will see her ads for what they are — don ’ t you ?
” he asks as he throws the poop bag into the garbage .
The beagle barks in agreement and licks his owner ’ s face .
These ads have been praised as cute , humorous and clever .
And the two spots have gone viral , generating almost nine million views while Warnock ’ s dog–oriented tweets accumulated over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ November .
The campaign has even profited off the pooch by selling “ Puppies for Warnock ” merchandise .
But some close observers of race and politics have noted that there is much more here than just an adorable electoral campaign .
These ads , they argue , are carefully crafted attempts to neutralize racial stereotypes that work against Warnock in his bid to become Georgia ’ s first African American senator .
Hakeem Jefferson , a Stanford professor and FiveThirtyEight contributor , tweeted , “ This ad is doing a lot .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ cute , but it is also meant to deracialize Warnock with this cute ‘ white people friendly ’ doggy.
” Fordham University political scientist and MSNBC contributor Christina Greer similarly tweeted , “ This ad will be taught in Race Politics classes for years to come…it is doing A LOT of silent heavy lifting.
” And The New York Times ’ s Jamelle Bouie concurred , tweeting in response to Greer ’ s comments , “ Yep .
The setting , Warnock ’ s outfit , even the dog breed all are sending @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Warnock ’ s pet beagle viewed as a “ white people doggy ” ?
And could his choice of pet have an effect on his electoral strategy ?
Well , for starters , there ’ s a large racial divide in dog ownership .
A 2006 Pew Research poll found that 45 percent of white Americans owned a dog compared to only 20 percent of African Americans .
And the way pet ownership is portrayed in popular culture further exacerbates that divide in the minds of the public .
In their classic study @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , “ Black Image in the White Mind , ” Robert Entman and Andrew Rojecki found no prime-time commercials containing African American pet owners .
“ According to the world of TV advertising , ” Entman and Rojecki surmised , “ Whites are the ones who occupy the realm of ideal humanity , of human warmth and connection , as symbolized occasionally by their love for their pets.
” That is one reason Warnock ’ s ads are so effective : They directly push back against this stereotype , showing an affectionate Black @ @ @ @ @ @ @ puppies .
Yet , as the tweets above suggest , the breed of Warnock ’ s dog is also doing a lot of work to counteract negative racial stereotypes of dog ownership .
Take what my University of California Irvine colleague Mary McThomas and I ’ ve found in our research on dog ownership : When we asked people which dog breeds they thought white and Black people were more likely to own , the majority guessed that Black people owned rottweilers and pit bulls while white people owned golden retrievers , collies @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s hardly a coincidence , either , that the two dog breeds stereotyped as Black-owned are also the two breeds that evoke the most fear from the public .
Over 40 percent of respondents in a 2018 Lucid survey we conducted said that “ scary ” described pit bulls and rottweilers “ extremely ” or “ very well ” ( 46 and 41 percent , respectively ) .
But only about 10 percent said the same thing about golden retrievers , collies , Dalmatians and Labradors .
( These four breeds were all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ favorably than rottweilers and pit bulls in our 2020 surveys as well . )
Unfortunately , we did not specifically ask about beagles in our surveys , but the commentary on Warnock ’ s ads argues that beagles fit squarely among the adored and approachable dog breeds that Americans generally associate with white people .
That ’ s why the breed of Warnock ’ s dog is so important in how he ’ s pitching himself to voters .
As Jefferson also noted on Twitter , Warnock ’ s beagle can be thought @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ white-friendly ” message to voters , something like , “ How can I be the scary ( Black ) guy she ’ s depicting ” with a dog like that ?
Of course , it ’ s impossible to say whether this was the intent behind Warnock ’ s dog ads .
But political science research has shown that African American candidates often try to deploy deracialization strategies like this to protect themselves from widespread stereotypes about Black political leadership — stereotypes that tend to paint African American politicians as radical extremists @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Black interests at the expense of white people .
This is arguably all the more important in a campaign where Republicans have explicitly tried to tie Warnock to Black radicalism — especially considering this is a Southern state where white voters are still overwhelmingly Republican .
( Stacey Abrams won only a quarter of the white vote in her losing 2018 bid to become Georgia ’ s first African American governor . )
It ’ s true that Georgia has since emerged as a swing state , voting for a Democrat for president @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but it ’ s unclear how much of that had to do with Trump and how much it may have been a sign of a more permanent shift in Georgia ’ s politics .
Warnock ’ s dog ads may well be thought of as a dog whistle to voters who have lingering concerns about Black political leadership .

If he wins next month, Raphael Warnock may have his pet beagle to thank.
So far, Warnock, the Democratic candidate in one of Georgia’s two Senate runoff elections, has aired two ads featuring his dog. In the first, he uses his cuddly canine to preempt negative GOP attacks against him — attacks that have tried to paint him as an ideological extremist and tie him to far-left Black activists.
Get ready Georgia. The negative ads against us are coming. But that won’t stop us from fighting for a better future for Georgians and focusing on the issues that matter. pic.twitter.com/VN0YIA02MG — Reverend Raphael Warnock (@ReverendWarnock) November 5, 2020
In the second ad, the pooch plays an even more prominent role, with Warnock walking his dog through a suburban neighborhood, poop bag in hand, while denouncing Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler’s “smear ads” against him.
[Related: Latest Polls Of The Georgia Senate Runoff Elections]
“I think Georgians will see her ads for what they are — don’t you?” he asks as he throws the poop bag into the garbage. The beagle barks in agreement and licks his owner’s face.
I told you the smear ads were coming, but Georgians will see Sen. @Kloeffler’s ads for what they are. pic.twitter.com/0sgU8ndC63 — Reverend Raphael Warnock (@ReverendWarnock) November 24, 2020
These ads have been praised as cute, humorous and clever. And the two spots have gone viral, generating almost nine million views while Warnock’s dog–oriented tweets accumulated over half a million likes on Twitter in November. The campaign has even profited off the pooch by selling “Puppies for Warnock” merchandise.
But some close observers of race and politics have noted that there is much more here than just an adorable electoral campaign. These ads, they argue, are carefully crafted attempts to neutralize racial stereotypes that work against Warnock in his bid to become Georgia’s first African American senator.
Will Georgia stay blue? | FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast
Hakeem Jefferson, a Stanford professor and FiveThirtyEight contributor, tweeted, “This ad is doing a lot. It’s obv[iously] cute, but it is also meant to deracialize Warnock with this cute ‘white people friendly’ doggy.” Fordham University political scientist and MSNBC contributor Christina Greer similarly tweeted, “This ad will be taught in Race Politics classes for years to come…it is doing A LOT of silent heavy lifting.” And The New York Times’s Jamelle Bouie concurred, tweeting in response to Greer’s comments, “Yep. The setting, Warnock’s outfit, even the dog breed all are sending a specific message.”
But why is Warnock’s pet beagle viewed as a “white people doggy”? And could his choice of pet have an effect on his electoral strategy?
Well, for starters, there’s a large racial divide in dog ownership. A 2006 Pew Research poll found that 45 percent of white Americans owned a dog compared to only 20 percent of African Americans. And the way pet ownership is portrayed in popular culture further exacerbates that divide in the minds of the public. In their classic study of media and race in the 1990s, “Black Image in the White Mind,” Robert Entman and Andrew Rojecki found no prime-time commercials containing African American pet owners. “According to the world of TV advertising,” Entman and Rojecki surmised, “Whites are the ones who occupy the realm of ideal humanity, of human warmth and connection, as symbolized occasionally by their love for their pets.” That is one reason Warnock’s ads are so effective: They directly push back against this stereotype, showing an affectionate Black dog owner who explicitly says he loves puppies.
[Related: Warnock And Ossoff Are Testing A New Strategy For Democrats In The South]
Yet, as the tweets above suggest, the breed of Warnock’s dog is also doing a lot of work to counteract negative racial stereotypes of dog ownership. Take what my University of California Irvine colleague Mary McThomas and I’ve found in our research on dog ownership: When we asked people which dog breeds they thought white and Black people were more likely to own, the majority guessed that Black people owned rottweilers and pit bulls while white people owned golden retrievers, collies, Labradors and Dalmatians.
It’s hardly a coincidence, either, that the two dog breeds stereotyped as Black-owned are also the two breeds that evoke the most fear from the public. Over 40 percent of respondents in a 2018 Lucid survey we conducted said that “scary” described pit bulls and rottweilers “extremely” or “very well” (46 and 41 percent, respectively). But only about 10 percent said the same thing about golden retrievers, collies, Dalmatians and Labradors. (These four breeds were all rated at least 15 percentage points more favorably than rottweilers and pit bulls in our 2020 surveys as well.)
Unfortunately, we did not specifically ask about beagles in our surveys, but the commentary on Warnock’s ads argues that beagles fit squarely among the adored and approachable dog breeds that Americans generally associate with white people. That’s why the breed of Warnock’s dog is so important in how he’s pitching himself to voters. As Jefferson also noted on Twitter, Warnock’s beagle can be thought of as trying to communicate a specific “white-friendly” message to voters, something like, “How can I be the scary (Black) guy she’s depicting” with a dog like that?
[Split-Ticket Voters Are A Small Group, But They Could Decide The Georgia Runoffs]
Of course, it’s impossible to say whether this was the intent behind Warnock’s dog ads. But political science research has shown that African American candidates often try to deploy deracialization strategies like this to protect themselves from widespread stereotypes about Black political leadership — stereotypes that tend to paint African American politicians as radical extremists who govern exclusively for the benefit of Black interests at the expense of white people.
This is arguably all the more important in a campaign where Republicans have explicitly tried to tie Warnock to Black radicalism — especially considering this is a Southern state where white voters are still overwhelmingly Republican. (Stacey Abrams won only a quarter of the white vote in her losing 2018 bid to become Georgia’s first African American governor.) It’s true that Georgia has since emerged as a swing state, voting for a Democrat for president for the first time since 1992, but it’s unclear how much of that had to do with Trump and how much it may have been a sign of a more permanent shift in Georgia’s politics. Warnock’s dog ads may well be thought of as a dog whistle to voters who have lingering concerns about Black political leadership.
What the COVID-19 vaccine means for political battles to come


fivethirtyeight--2020-12-15--What The COVID-19 Vaccine Means For The Political Battles To Come

In this episode of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast , the crew discusses the challenges presented by both the ongoing pandemic @ @ @ @ @ continued attempts to overturn the election results .

In this episode of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, the crew discusses the challenges presented by both the ongoing pandemic and President Trump’s continued attempts to overturn the election results.
[Related: Why A Big Bloc of Americans Is Wary Of The COVID-19 Vaccine — Even As Experts Hope To See Widespread Immunization]
Which celebrity would Dr. Anthony Fauci like to publicly get the vaccine?


fivethirtyeight--2020-12-15--A Record-Breaking Number Of Women Will Be In Biden’s Cabinet

Though the president ’ s Cabinet is meant to expose him to a diverse set of perspectives and backgrounds , until recently , that meant diversity of geography or ideology , not diversity of gender or race .
It took until 1933 for the first woman to be appointed to a Cabinet position ( Labor Secretary Frances Perkins ) and 1966 for the first African American ( Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Robert Weaver ) .
And even since then , women and people of color have consistently been underrepresented in the Cabinet .
But Joe Biden ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The president-elect has chosen nine people of color for Cabinet-level posts so far and has promised that his Cabinet will be the most racially diverse in history .
And with his reported nomination of former Michigan Gov .
Jennifer Granholm for secretary of energy , he has now chosen nine women ( compared with eight men ) to serve in these positions as well .
According to our research , if they ’ re all confirmed , it would break the record for the most women ever to serve in the 25 current @ @ @ @ @ @ @ possibility that Biden ’ s Cabinet could be the first in American history to include at least as many women as men .
But while gender parity represents progress , numeric representation in and of itself doesn ’ t mean that men and women have equal political power and influence .
For example , women have historically been underrepresented in the “ inner Cabinet ” — the vice president , attorney general and secretaries of state , defense and treasury — who typically have the closest ties to the president .
And although @ @ @ @ @ @ @ under Biden ( the country ’ s first female vice president , treasury secretary and director of national intelligence ) , a handful of Cabinet-level posts still have yet to be led by a woman .
Historically there have just been fewer women than men in careers relevant to these roles , and those who are floated for these offices often run up against gender stereotypes that women lack the traits to succeed in them .
For example , a woman has never led the stereotypically male-dominated Department of Defense — and that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ will not break in 2021 .
Although former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michèle Flournoy was initially considered the front-runner for defense secretary , Biden eventually opted for retired Army Gen. Lloyd Austin ( who , notably , would also make history as the first Black defense secretary ) .
Research by political scientists Tiffany Barnes and Diana O ’ Brien may explain why a woman has yet to hold this office .
Focusing on the post-Cold War era , they found that women were less likely to be appointed as defense ministers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at least one death or where military spending is high .
“ Women are stereotyped as more dovish , ” O ’ Brien told FiveThirtyEight , noting that one reason a woman hasn ’ t been named secretary of defense is that “ our defense position fits a stereotype about conflict and war.
” However , Barnes and O ’ Brien found that this isn ’ t the case everywhere : In countries that are more concerned with peacekeeping or with breaking from former military abuses of power , women are more likely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ These dynamics may also explain why so few women have held other national-security- or military-related Cabinet posts .
President Trump ’ s outgoing appointee Gina Haspel is the only woman to have led the Central Intelligence Agency , and Avril Haines is slated to be the first female head of the U.S. intelligence community .
And since the Department of Veterans Affairs became a Cabinet department in 1989 , it has never been led by a woman — a streak that will continue under Biden with his appointment of Denis McDonough .
In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been a female treasury secretary in 231 years of American history ; Biden appointee Janet Yellen would be the first .
What ’ s more , there are only a handful of women who have held the equivalent post in other countries with large economies .
However , ongoing research by Barnes and O ’ Brien has also found that women are more likely to be appointed to economic posts in precarious times , such as during , or following , a financial crisis or economic scandal .
This finding is especially troubling @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fosters the perception that women are less effective leaders in these roles — often referred to as the “ glass cliff.
” And given the economic recession caused by the coronavirus pandemic , Yellen ’ s appointment certainly fits this pattern , making her appointment high-stakes for future female treasury secretaries .
By contrast , other Cabinet-level departments — such as the Small Business Administration , the Department of Labor , the Department of Health and Human Services and the Environmental Protection Agency — have seen more women at the helm .
This @ @ @ @ @ @ @ departments are more in line with stereotypes of female leadership or draw from career paths in which there are simply more female professionals .
Women ’ s presumed issue expertise in areas like welfare and health care doesn ’ t map neatly onto all Cabinet positions filled by more women , but it ’ s one possible explanation for why more women are appointed to some roles and not others .
The Small Business Administration is particularly interesting in that its explicit economic focus doesn ’ t fit neatly into this framework .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ men ( eight ) and women ( seven ) have led it since 1977 , making it the Cabinet position that has historically come the closest to gender equality .
Similarly , six of the 13 labor secretaries since Jimmy Carter ’ s administration have been women — and , as we mentioned at the outset , the first woman to ever serve in a president ’ s Cabinet , Perkins , was tasked with running the Labor Department .
Perkins was an advocate for workers ’ rights in this position and helped @ @ @ @ @ @ @ including unemployment insurance , child-labor laws and other protections for workers like a minimum wage .
Even today , more than 80 years later , this department is concerned with safeguarding workers , which increasingly includes fair employment practices and a more female workforce .
This , in turn , might help explain why women often head this agency , as research has shown that they are often perceived as better able to handle these issues , and , in fact , have had an impact in these roles .
So while you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appoint enough women to his inner Cabinet , or that the lack of women leading stereotypically masculine departments continues to be a problem , Biden ’ s appointment of a record number of women does matter .
Picking more women as Cabinet officials has a snowball effect .
As Barnes told us , “ Once you start on a trajectory of nominating more women , it ’ s hard to roll it back.
” And , as you saw in the first chart , administrations tend to maintain ( or closely maintain ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a phenomenon often referred to as the “ concrete floor.
” For instance , Carter started his administration with two female Cabinet members , Ronald Reagan with two , George H.W .
Bush with three , Bill Clinton with five , George W. Bush with four and Barack Obama with eight .
( Granted , Trump represented a step back , starting his administration with just four women in his Cabinet . )
But , generally speaking , the more opportunities women see available in leadership roles , the greater their motivation will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ turn , the more women who populate these pipelines to power , the better-positioned they will be to assume political leadership .

UPDATE (Dec. 17, 2020, 3:30 p.m.): On Thursday, President-elect Joe Biden tapped Deb Haaland to be the first Native American secretary of the interior. As we wrote earlier this week, Biden is on track to name a historic number of women and people of color to his Cabinet.
Though the president’s Cabinet is meant to expose him to a diverse set of perspectives and backgrounds, until recently, that meant diversity of geography or ideology, not diversity of gender or race. It took until 1933 for the first woman to be appointed to a Cabinet position (Labor Secretary Frances Perkins) and 1966 for the first African American (Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Robert Weaver). And even since then, women and people of color have consistently been underrepresented in the Cabinet.
What the COVID-19 vaccine means for political battles to come
But Joe Biden’s administration seems determined to change that. The president-elect has chosen 11 people of color for Cabinet-level posts so far and has promised that his Cabinet will be the most racially diverse in history. And as of Thursday, Dec. 17, he has now chosen 10 women (compared with nine men) to serve in these positions as well. According to our research, if they’re all confirmed, it would break the record for the most women ever to serve in the 25 current Cabinet-level positions. It also raises the possibility that Biden’s Cabinet could be the first in American history to include at least as many women as men.
But while gender parity represents progress, numeric representation in and of itself doesn’t mean that men and women have equal political power and influence. For example, women have historically been underrepresented in the “inner Cabinet” — the vice president, attorney general and secretaries of state, defense and treasury — who typically have the closest ties to the president. And although we can expect a number of firsts under Biden (the country’s first female vice president, treasury secretary and director of national intelligence ), a handful of Cabinet-level posts still have yet to be led by a woman. Historically there have just been fewer women than men in careers relevant to these roles, and those who are floated for these offices often run up against gender stereotypes that women lack the traits to succeed in them.
[How Black, Latino And Progressive Democrats Are Forcing Biden To Rethink His Cabinet Picks]
For example, a woman has never led the stereotypically male-dominated Department of Defense — and that is one barrier that the Biden administration will not break in 2021. Although former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michèle Flournoy was initially considered the front-runner for defense secretary, Biden eventually opted for retired Army Gen. Lloyd Austin (who, notably, would also make history as the first Black defense secretary).
Research by political scientists Tiffany Barnes and Diana O’Brien may explain why a woman has yet to hold this office. Focusing on the post-Cold War era, they found that women were less likely to be appointed as defense ministers in countries engaged in international conflicts with at least one death or where military spending is high. “Women are stereotyped as more dovish,” O’Brien told FiveThirtyEight, noting that one reason a woman hasn’t been named secretary of defense is that “our defense position fits a stereotype about conflict and war.” However, Barnes and O’Brien found that this isn’t the case everywhere: In countries that are more concerned with peacekeeping or with breaking from former military abuses of power, women are more likely to be appointed as defense minister.
[5 Ways Biden Might Differ From — Or Agree With — Trump On Technology]
These dynamics may also explain why so few women have held other national-security- or military-related Cabinet posts. President Trump’s outgoing appointee Gina Haspel is the only woman to have led the Central Intelligence Agency, and Avril Haines is slated to be the first female head of the U.S. intelligence community. And since the Department of Veterans Affairs became a Cabinet department in 1989, it has never been led by a woman — a streak that will continue under Biden with his appointment of Denis McDonough.
In the same vein, there has never been a female treasury secretary in 231 years of American history; Biden appointee Janet Yellen would be the first. What’s more, there are only a handful of women who have held the equivalent post in other countries with large economies.
However, ongoing research by Barnes and O’Brien has also found that women are more likely to be appointed to economic posts in precarious times, such as during, or following, a financial crisis or economic scandal. This finding is especially troubling, as they argue this phenomenon often fosters the perception that women are less effective leaders in these roles — often referred to as the “glass cliff.” And given the economic recession caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Yellen’s appointment certainly fits this pattern, making her appointment high-stakes for future female treasury secretaries.
By contrast, other Cabinet-level departments — such as the Small Business Administration, the Department of Labor, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Environmental Protection Agency — have seen more women at the helm.
This stems partly from the fact that these departments are more in line with stereotypes of female leadership or draw from career paths in which there are simply more female professionals. Women’s presumed issue expertise in areas like welfare and health care doesn’t map neatly onto all Cabinet positions filled by more women, but it’s one possible explanation for why more women are appointed to some roles and not others.
[Related: What We’ve Learned About The Biden Administration From His Staffing Choices So Far]
The Small Business Administration is particularly interesting in that its explicit economic focus doesn’t fit neatly into this framework. Nevertheless, almost an equal number of men (eight) and women (seven) have led it since 1977, making it the Cabinet position that has historically come the closest to gender equality.
Similarly, six of the 13 labor secretaries since Jimmy Carter’s administration have been women — and, as we mentioned at the outset, the first woman to ever serve in a president’s Cabinet, Perkins, was tasked with running the Labor Department. Perkins was an advocate for workers’ rights in this position and helped implement aspects of the New Deal, including unemployment insurance, child-labor laws and other protections for workers like a minimum wage. Even today, more than 80 years later, this department is concerned with safeguarding workers, which increasingly includes fair employment practices and a more female workforce. This, in turn, might help explain why women often head this agency, as research has shown that they are often perceived as better able to handle these issues, and, in fact, have had an impact in these roles.
So while you may think that Biden didn’t appoint enough women to his inner Cabinet, or that the lack of women leading stereotypically masculine departments continues to be a problem, Biden’s appointment of a record number of women does matter. Picking more women as Cabinet officials has a snowball effect. As Barnes told us, “Once you start on a trajectory of nominating more women, it’s hard to roll it back.”
And, as you saw in the first chart, administrations tend to maintain (or closely maintain) the momentum of the previous administration, a phenomenon often referred to as the “concrete floor.” For instance, Carter started his administration with two female Cabinet members, Ronald Reagan with two, George H.W. Bush with three, Bill Clinton with five, George W. Bush with four and Barack Obama with eight. (Granted, Trump represented a step back, starting his administration with just four women in his Cabinet.) But, generally speaking, the more opportunities women see available in leadership roles, the greater their motivation will become to pursue professional opportunities. In turn, the more women who populate these pipelines to power, the better-positioned they will be to assume political leadership.
What Trump revealed about America | FiveThirtyEight


fivethirtyeight--2020-12-16--Why The Suburbs Have Shifted Blue

Why The Suburbs Have Shifted Blue

President Trump spent the last few months of the presidential campaign appealing to — and sometimes even pleading with — suburban voters .
At a rally in Pennsylvania in October , Trump called out suburban women specifically , saying that “ they should like me more than anybody here tonight because I ended the regulation that destroyed your neighborhood , ” referring to his administration ’ s move to end a government program aimed at reducing segregation in suburban areas .
“ I ended the regulation that brought crime to the suburbs , ” said Trump .
“ [ A @ @ @ @ @ @ @ live the American dream.
” It was plain to see that Trump wasn ’ t talking to all suburbanites , though .
He appeared to have a specific vision of the suburbs in mind : Something like the modern day equivalent of the white , well-to-do characters from 1950s sitcoms who had big , well-manicured lawns and white picket fences , agreed with their neighbors about most things — from which presidential candidate to support to what makes a good tuna casserole — and were , in the past , the targets of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Only this strategy didn ’ t work .
Because this version of suburbia is increasingly hard to find .
Suburban and exurban counties turned away from Trump and toward Democrat Joe Biden in states across the country , including in key battleground states like Pennsylvania and Georgia .
In part , this may be because the suburbs are simply far more diverse than they used to be .
But suburbs have also become increasingly well-educated — and that may actually better explain why so many suburbs and exurbs are turning blue than just @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to Ashley Jardina , a political science professor at Duke University who studies white identity politics , it ’ s not that racial diversity isn ’ t a factor .
Among white people , at least , educational attainment is often a proxy for how open they are to growing racial diversity , with more highly educated white people likely to think increased racial diversity is a good thing .
“ Education is so important because it ’ s intertwined with racial attitudes among white people , ” Jardina said .
No matter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s clear that communities that were pretty much uniformly white only a few decades ago are now far more racially diverse , with Black , Hispanic and Asian Americans making up larger shares of suburban and exurban populations than ever before .
According to our analysis of data from a “ diversity index ” developed by USA Today that calculates the chance that any two people chosen at random from a given area are of different races or ethnicities , most suburbs have grown at least somewhat more diverse over the past 10 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in some of the states — like Georgia , Wisconsin , Pennsylvania and Michigan — that were pivotal for Biden this year .
On the surface , those demographic shifts may seem like good news for Democrats , since nonwhite voters are much more likely to identify as Democratic than white voters .
But when we dug into how these diversifying parts of the country have actually voted , we didn ’ t find a uniform shift toward Democrats .
Some suburbs that grew more racially diverse over the past decade saw a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ or even moved slightly further into Trump ’ s column .
And other suburbs that didn ’ t diversify much at all still became much bluer in 2020 .
Rather , it was education — and particularly how much more educated a place has gotten over the past 10 years — that was more closely related to increased support for Biden ( especially once accounting for how educated a county was in 2010 ) .
Growing racial diversity in an area was still important , since the suburban counties that saw the biggest @ @ @ @ @ @ @ remained less racially diverse and less educated .
But the political swing among diversifying counties was much less uniform than it was in counties that became more educated .
Take Henry County , Georgia , a mostly exurban part of the Atlanta metropolitan area .
Voters there narrowly backed Hillary Clinton by 4 points in 2016 , but they supported Biden by a whopping 20 points this past November — a 16-point Democratic swing .
What happened ?
Henry County was already pretty diverse , but it became even more so in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the share of its Black population is now nearly equal to its white share .
Meanwhile , the share of the population with a college degree grew slightly faster than was typical across other suburban and exurban counties .
This made Henry one of the many increasingly diverse and educated counties in the Atlanta area that shifted to the left from 2016 to 2020 , helping Biden become the first Democratic presidential candidate to carry the state since 1992 .
And it ’ s suburbs like Henry that produced some of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the 2020 election , according to William Frey , a demographer and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution ’ s Metropolitan Policy Program .
The patterns we observed in Henry County can be seen in suburbs across the Sun Belt .
Shifting suburban populations in states like Texas and Arizona have made presidential elections there much more competitive in a relatively short period of time , while according to Frey , demographic change has been happening in suburban areas in Rust Belt states like Michigan and Wisconsin too , but at a slower @ @ @ @ @ @ @ either more diverse or more educated , but not both ?
Suburban and exurban counties that grew more diverse but did not become more educated still swung toward Biden in 2020 , but by a much smaller margin .
It ’ s especially striking when you compare these places to areas that became much more educated but not more diverse , as those places actually had moved more toward Biden , on average .
Consider Volusia County , Florida , a suburban-exurban county northeast of Orlando in central Florida .
Volusia became marginally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ won it by 14 points after winning it by 13 points in 2016 .
This , despite the fact that Volusia has become more diverse over the past decade , primarily through an increase in its Hispanic population ( although the county is still roughly 70 percent non-Hispanic white ) .
However , the share of Volusia ’ s population with a four-year college degree hasn ’ t increased as much as in other suburban and exurban places .
It ’ s also possible that because the population was less educated as a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely to respond to the county ’ s growing diversity by becoming more conservative — canceling out some of the effects of having a growing nonwhite , Democratic-leaning share of the community .
In her own research , Jardina has found similar dynamics at play , although she hasn ’ t focused on the suburbs specifically .
In general , though , Jardina said , “ [ W ] hites who have a higher level of racial identity and live in places where there ’ s been a much greater change in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vote conservatively.
” That may help explain why suburban and exurban areas like Volusia County that became notably more diverse but not more educated didn ’ t move as much to the left as places that became more educated but not more diverse .
Take Ottawa County , Michigan , which sits along the coast of Lake Michigan as part of the Grand Rapids metropolitan area .
The county remains pretty Republican , but Trump only carried it by 21 points this year after winning it by 30 points four years ago — @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And although the racial and ethnic makeup of Ottawa ’ s population hasn ’ t changed much since 2010 , the share that holds a bachelor ’ s degree has shot up from 29 percent to 34 percent , which might explain the county ’ s swing .
Overall , the Democratic gains there were part of a larger swing in the traditionally Republican Grand Rapids region that helped Biden carry Michigan .
So what do these trends mean for Democrats — and Republicans — going forward ?
Jardina stressed to us that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not destiny .
Democrats might struggle to reproduce Biden ’ s strong performance in the suburbs , particularly if their Republican opponents don ’ t rely as heavily on racialized appeals and transparently racist tropes as Trump .
“ The big question mark for me is what happens in these suburban areas in two years or four years if [ Republican candidates ] adopt a similar strategy to Trump but with more competence and decorum , ” Jardina said .
“ I ’ ll put it this way — I don ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ stay competitive in the suburbs.
” On the other hand , both Frey and Jardina said it ’ s possible that the demographic realignment of the suburbs could end up creating a more lasting political shift — one in which the suburbs and exurbs look and vote a lot more like urban areas , and a lot less like more rural places .
Frey predicted , though , that the big political shifts we saw this year in places like the Sun Belt might persist — or even accelerate — simply because they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the demographic changes in those areas .
But a lot will depend on Democrats ’ ability to mobilize the diverse groups that now are looking more and more like typical suburban voters .
“ The future of the Democratic Party is clearly with these younger , more diverse , more educated populations , ” Frey said .
“ But they have to figure out how to keep them energized and voting .
”

President Trump spent the last few months of the presidential campaign appealing to — and sometimes even pleading with — suburban voters. At a rally in Pennsylvania in October, Trump called out suburban women specifically, saying that “they should like me more than anybody here tonight because I ended the regulation that destroyed your neighborhood,” referring to his administration’s move to end a government program aimed at reducing segregation in suburban areas. “I ended the regulation that brought crime to the suburbs,” said Trump. “[A]nd you’re going to live the American dream.”
It was plain to see that Trump wasn’t talking to all suburbanites, though. He appeared to have a specific vision of the suburbs in mind: Something like the modern day equivalent of the white, well-to-do characters from 1950s sitcoms who had big, well-manicured lawns and white picket fences, agreed with their neighbors about most things — from which presidential candidate to support to what makes a good tuna casserole — and were, in the past, the targets of racial dog-whistles like Trump’s.
Only this strategy didn’t work. Because this version of suburbia is increasingly hard to find.
The electoral problems facing Republicans | FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast
Suburban and exurban counties turned away from Trump and toward Democrat Joe Biden in states across the country, including in key battleground states like Pennsylvania and Georgia. In part, this may be because the suburbs are simply far more diverse than they used to be. But suburbs have also become increasingly well-educated — and that may actually better explain why so many suburbs and exurbs are turning blue than just increased diversity on its own.
According to Ashley Jardina, a political science professor at Duke University who studies white identity politics, it’s not that racial diversity isn’t a factor. Among white people, at least, educational attainment is often a proxy for how open they are to growing racial diversity, with more highly educated white people likely to think increased racial diversity is a good thing. “Education is so important because it’s intertwined with racial attitudes among white people,” Jardina said.
[Raphael Warnock’s Dog Ads Cut Against White Voters’ Stereotypes Of Black People]
No matter how you slice it, it’s clear that communities that were pretty much uniformly white only a few decades ago are now far more racially diverse, with Black, Hispanic and Asian Americans making up larger shares of suburban and exurban populations than ever before. According to our analysis of data from a “diversity index” developed by USA Today that calculates the chance that any two people chosen at random from a given area are of different races or ethnicities, most suburbs have grown at least somewhat more diverse over the past 10 years. That’s particularly true in some of the states — like Georgia, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan — that were pivotal for Biden this year.
On the surface, those demographic shifts may seem like good news for Democrats, since nonwhite voters are much more likely to identify as Democratic than white voters. But when we dug into how these diversifying parts of the country have actually voted, we didn’t find a uniform shift toward Democrats. Some suburbs that grew more racially diverse over the past decade saw a smaller swing toward Biden than others — or even moved slightly further into Trump’s column. And other suburbs that didn’t diversify much at all still became much bluer in 2020.
‘Those suburban votes were key to putting Biden over the top’: Nate Silver
Rather, it was education — and particularly how much more educated a place has gotten over the past 10 years — that was more closely related to increased support for Biden (especially once accounting for how educated a county was in 2010). Growing racial diversity in an area was still important, since the suburban counties that saw the biggest swing toward Trump were the ones that remained less racially diverse and less educated. But the political swing among diversifying counties was much less uniform than it was in counties that became more educated.
Take Henry County, Georgia, a mostly exurban part of the Atlanta metropolitan area. Voters there narrowly backed Hillary Clinton by 4 points in 2016, but they supported Biden by a whopping 20 points this past November — a 16-point Democratic swing. What happened? Henry County was already pretty diverse, but it became even more so in the past decade. Once majority non-Hispanic white, the share of its Black population is now nearly equal to its white share. Meanwhile, the share of the population with a college degree grew slightly faster than was typical across other suburban and exurban counties. This made Henry one of the many increasingly diverse and educated counties in the Atlanta area that shifted to the left from 2016 to 2020, helping Biden become the first Democratic presidential candidate to carry the state since 1992.
And it’s suburbs like Henry that produced some of the swiftest and most dramatic political shifts of the 2020 election, according to William Frey, a demographer and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program. The patterns we observed in Henry County can be seen in suburbs across the Sun Belt. Shifting suburban populations in states like Texas and Arizona have made presidential elections there much more competitive in a relatively short period of time, while according to Frey, demographic change has been happening in suburban areas in Rust Belt states like Michigan and Wisconsin too, but at a slower pace.
[Related: How The 2020 Election Changed The Electoral Map]
What about places that become either more diverse or more educated, but not both? Suburban and exurban counties that grew more diverse but did not become more educated still swung toward Biden in 2020, but by a much smaller margin. It’s especially striking when you compare these places to areas that became much more educated but not more diverse, as those places actually had moved more toward Biden, on average.
Consider Volusia County, Florida, a suburban-exurban county northeast of Orlando in central Florida. Volusia became marginally more Republican this year, as Trump won it by 14 points after winning it by 13 points in 2016. This, despite the fact that Volusia has become more diverse over the past decade, primarily through an increase in its Hispanic population (although the county is still roughly 70 percent non-Hispanic white). However, the share of Volusia’s population with a four-year college degree hasn’t increased as much as in other suburban and exurban places.
It’s also possible that because the population was less educated as a whole, the white residents were more likely to respond to the county’s growing diversity by becoming more conservative — canceling out some of the effects of having a growing nonwhite, Democratic-leaning share of the community. In her own research, Jardina has found similar dynamics at play, although she hasn’t focused on the suburbs specifically. In general, though, Jardina said, “[W]hites who have a higher level of racial identity and live in places where there’s been a much greater change in the foreign-born population are much more likely to vote conservatively.”
That may help explain why suburban and exurban areas like Volusia County that became notably more diverse but not more educated didn’t move as much to the left as places that became more educated but not more diverse. Take Ottawa County, Michigan, which sits along the coast of Lake Michigan as part of the Grand Rapids metropolitan area. The county remains pretty Republican, but Trump only carried it by 21 points this year after winning it by 30 points four years ago — a 9-point swing toward the Democrats. And although the racial and ethnic makeup of Ottawa’s population hasn’t changed much since 2010, the share that holds a bachelor’s degree has shot up from 29 percent to 34 percent, which might explain the county’s swing. Overall, the Democratic gains there were part of a larger swing in the traditionally Republican Grand Rapids region that helped Biden carry Michigan.
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So what do these trends mean for Democrats — and Republicans — going forward? Jardina stressed to us that in the short term, demography is not destiny. Democrats might struggle to reproduce Biden’s strong performance in the suburbs, particularly if their Republican opponents don’t rely as heavily on racialized appeals and transparently racist tropes as Trump. “The big question mark for me is what happens in these suburban areas in two years or four years if [Republican candidates] adopt a similar strategy to Trump but with more competence and decorum,” Jardina said. “I’ll put it this way — I don’t think Republicans have lost their opportunity to stay competitive in the suburbs.”
On the other hand, both Frey and Jardina said it’s possible that the demographic realignment of the suburbs could end up creating a more lasting political shift — one in which the suburbs and exurbs look and vote a lot more like urban areas, and a lot less like more rural places. Frey predicted, though, that the big political shifts we saw this year in places like the Sun Belt might persist — or even accelerate — simply because they map better onto the speed and breadth of the demographic changes in those areas. But a lot will depend on Democrats’ ability to mobilize the diverse groups that now are looking more and more like typical suburban voters.
“The future of the Democratic Party is clearly with these younger, more diverse, more educated populations,” Frey said. “But they have to figure out how to keep them energized and voting.”
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fivethirtyeight--2020-12-15--A Record-Breaking Number Of Women Could Be In Biden’s Cabinet


fivethirtyeight--2020-12-15--Biden’s Cabinet Could Be The First To Include At Least As Many Women As Men