[ad_1]
Joe Biden became the most voted candidate in American history. The Democrat and vice president of Barack Obama broke the barrier imposed in 2016 by Hillary Clinton who, despite winning the elections in number of votes (more than 61 million), failed to reach the White House. A 77-year-old white man is now rewriting the history of his party, which has passed 72 million votes. The Democratic victory, led by Senator Kamala Harris, was built on the reconquest of the Midwest, lost in the populist wave led by Republican Donald Trump. A possible Biden victory shapes the political map of America for the next four years. The following are some aspects of the new configuration.
Support our journalism. Subscribe to EL PAÍS by clicking here
The Rust Belt turns blue again
It took several hours, but Biden finally managed to tip the balance in the Midwest. Those were days of an agonizing countdown that ended up putting Michigan, Wisconsin and possibly Pennsylvania on the Democratic side. The states form the so-called Rust Belt, the Rust Belt, along with Indiana and Ohio, maintained by Donald Trump. This industrial region was a solid Democratic stronghold, which found a barn of work in the working class. Yet four years ago, the region joined Trump’s experiment, embittered by decades of decline and job losses that went to other parts of the world where labor is cheaper. The regions gave a vote of confidence to the unusual Republican candidate, who promised to defend all those forgotten in the field.
The change in voting direction does not mean that rural people have changed their minds. These territories continued to largely support Trump. Urban areas, much more diverse and with greater electoral weight, turned in favor of Biden. This is the case in Kent County, Michigan, where Trump ended his campaign on Monday night. He tried to repeat the path he had traced four years ago. There it closed and there it won. But Grand Rapids, the county’s main city and its suburbs, turned its back on him by voting for Biden. In Wisconsin, the Democrat boosted Hillary Clinton’s results in major cities.
Southern conquests
Georgia has been voting for the Republican Party for 24 years. The last time he supported a Democratic candidate it was Bill Clinton, a Southerner from Arkansas. Biden, however, scored major victories in the state’s major cities, vastly improving Hillary Clinton’s 2016 performance in the region. If Barack Obama’s victory map overlaps with Biden’s, it wouldn’t make much of a difference. There were no counties that changed sides. It was the turnout that changed and strongly pushed the Democrat. Biden surpassed one million votes in the Atlanta metropolitan area, the largest in the state. Four years ago, Clinton barely exceeded 800,000 votes in that area. The same happened in other urban centers in the region.
The change is explained by the arrival of new voter profiles. They are younger and have higher education. This draws a line with the rural areas of one of the states that were part of the Confederacy. It’s not just demographics that explain this story of change. Georgia has a white majority, but 51% of Atlantans are African American. Racial tension and lack of representation suffered throughout the Trump Administration were also a factor in the massive minority vote. In 2018, Stacey Abrams, a community rights activist, tried to become governor of the Democratic Party. He failed, but his effort led 800,000 people to register as new voters. And on Tuesday they voted for the first time.
Other traditional Republican fiefdoms are undergoing similar transformations. This is the case in Texas, which was deemed certain to be painted red on election night. The question is how long. The gap between Democrats and Republicans has been closing thanks to increasingly diverse communities. Mitt Romney won the state with a difference of 12% over Obama. Trump did the same for Clinton with 9%. Pending final results, Biden narrowed the gap to 6%. Texas has 254 counties. The electoral weight is concentrated in 27, which produce 69% of the votes in this territory where 29 million people live. There are large urban centers like Dallas, Houston, Austin, San Antonio, and El Paso. They all have a growing Hispanic population, increasingly politically involved.
Latinos test their strength
The Latino vote was a determining factor in both Florida in the east and Arizona in the west. The battle in these states shows that politicians cannot view the Hispanic voter as a monolithic bloc. In Florida they were a tool for Trump’s victory, especially in Miami-Dade County. There he had the support of 55% of the population of Cuban origin. The number drops to 30% among Puerto Ricans and 48% among other Latinos, according to research published by NBC.
In Arizona, on the other hand, they were an instrument to propel Biden. Latinos represent 23% of the electorate in this border state that, with the exception of Bill Clinton in 1996, has voted for Republicans since 1952. Trump’s racist discourse and the immigration policies promoted by the most radical sectors of the Administration mobilized this minority, mainly of Mexican origin. Six out of ten voted for the Biden and Harris list in Maricopa County (Phoenix), where 60% of the state’s votes are concentrated. The Latino effort was accompanied by a coalition of Republicans disenchanted with Trump, led by Cindy McCain (widow of Senator John McCain). This was one of the least expected surprises in the choice of a country that has changed.
