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AUSTIN AND SAN MARCOS, USA – This is not the Texas of bang-bang movies. In Austin, cowboy hats give way to colorful masks with political messages. The barbecue is less aligned than the avocado toast. Country music is a hit, but in the “outlaw” version of local idol Willie Nelson, who asks Americans to vote because “the biggest weapon we have is called an electoral vote.” Now the trends of this progressive symbol embedded in the heart of oil, guns, and biblical republicanism are beginning to spread. The changes give Democrats hope of turning Texas into a blue state.
Voter turnout in the state is one of the signs that even if Texas does not become a Democrat this year, the trend for the future is that it will turn increasingly blue, due to demographic changes, such as a higher proportion of Latino and youth voters who have moved here to escape the price of rent in California. The proportion of white voters dropped from 62% in 2000 to 51% in 2018 according to the Pew Center.
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Trump advantage
And while Democrats cannot take Texas (the average poll shows little advantage for Trump), the state vote may weigh in favor of the popular vote for Joe Biden. So far, a week before the election, the number of Americans who have voted in Texas is already 82% of the total who voted four years ago. In total, more than 64 million have already voted throughout the country, approximately half of them in a dozen states that will be decisive in defining the winner in the Electoral College. On average, half of the voters who went to the polls in 2016 in these crucial states have already voted.
The higher the turnout in the United States, where voting is not mandatory, the greater the democratic advantage, argues Professor Jeremi Suri of the University of Texas.
– Republicans want to dissuade minorities and young people from voting, because (winning) is really a question of attendance – says the professor, who is categorical in the importance of the state, the second largest in the American Electoral College, for Republicans . – Without Texas, there is no Republican Party. That’s where they get their money from and that’s where their base is. They couldn’t survive
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One of the numbers that confirm the thesis is that the number of ballots sent by mail by voters registered as Democrats is double that sent by Republicans, according to the US Elections Project. It is for this reason that the Democrats’ campaign is more focused on mobilizing their own base to vote than on converting voters.
At a polling station in East Austin, one of Austin’s most diverse and youthful neighborhoods, Cynthia Muñoz, 35, took her Mexican-born mother to vote Monday morning. He hadn’t voted in 20 years.
– I hope Biden wins. I hope Texas turns blue, I saw that it is very close now, it will be very exciting if it happens.
Like Cynthia’s mother, other voters who voted in person in Austin on Monday had not left the chamber in past elections. Dora Jackson, 60, last voted for Barack Obama in 2012. This year, she chose to vote for the drive-in method: from inside the car.
– I’m voting for Biden because he’s a Democrat. He is a good man. And I don’t like Trump, he says, echoing one of the main arguments of Biden’s supporters.
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Austin’s progressive trends have spread to the neighbors. Until 2016, the city was a blue enclave in red territory, colors, respectively, of the Democratic and Republican parties. In the 2018 election that nearly led Democrat Beto O’Rourke to take the Senate seat from local Trump ally Ted Cruz, Hays County, bordering Austin, turned blue. Democrats hope the trend will continue.
Dave Wasserman, an analyst for the Cook Political Report, who makes election predictions, says Texas County was the first in the country to surpass the 2016 turnout even before Election Day.
Allan Sattiewhite went to the local government headquarters on Monday accompanied by his wife, Ronnie. They both voted for Biden: she did not vote in 2016 and is the voter profile that Democrats are looking for: people who have not mobilized for Hillary, but who do not want Trump for another four years.
– Trump doesn’t care. He knew everything [sobre o perigo do coronavírus] in February and didn’t talk to people. Many died and they need not have died. He could have told people to protect themselves, to wear masks. But I didn’t say it.
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It’s not just Democrats who vote before Election Day. Ryan Butler, 24, was also in local government to vote for the first time and, in his case, it was Trump. He likes the president for his support of the military.
– He did a lot for the military, he supported the troops, the other presidents didn’t support when they needed it. In addition, the tax cut helped my family with business, and the crisis on the border, here in Texas, was also a big problem, says the veteran, who does not agree with the thesis that the state is going to become a democrat. – I think Texas will continue as it has always been: Republican. Many Republicans don’t like taking polls.
Republican supports Biden
Austin is not just Polaroid cameras, All Star sneakers and roundtables moderated by Richard Linklater, a Texan director adored by alternative moviegoers of the 2000s, at South by Southwest, the world’s largest film, music and technology festival to host. celebrated every year in the state capital. until the pandemic.
In town, there’s also The Range in Austin, a shooting club where Texans can practice and meet up for “family fun nights,” shooting first and having dinner later – barbecue – for $ 199 for four people. There, the main protection guideline is not that users wear a mask, as in most businesses in the country and the world. The request is that you do not forget to bring glasses and earplugs against noise.
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At the booth, a 22-year-old student, John Quin, practiced shooting Monday afternoon, whom Trump could count on in 2016, when he led the state by a 9-point margin, lower than Mitt Romney and John McCain in elections. previous.
This is no longer the case now. Quin has already voted, and this time the vote went to Democrat Joe Biden. By being in a shooting club and not endorsing a Republican, John gives a timid response, but one that communicates the mindset of another audience that Democrats are trying to reach in the state – a bastion where Republicanism is more traditional, has roots, and it feeds. less of the ideological discourse of the president.
– I’m a Republican. I just don’t agree with Trump. Not at all – says John, one of the few visitors to the club who wore a mask last Monday.
