Texas is turning blue

Well, today is election day. Twenty-four hours from now and it will be all over (hopefully). If there is any justice in the world, Trump will have been spanked in the voting booths, although a simple win would suffice.

I read a column by George Will (published in National Review, July of this year). The title of his piece says it all: “If Texas goes blue, Republicans are finished.” California and New York are solidly blue; the Democratic candidate has easily carried both states for the past several Presidential elections, and provide an anchor on both coasts for the Democratic party. Add Illinois and the other states that vote reliably Democratic and it adds up to something over 240 electoral votes. Texas is the single large state (i.e. more than a handful of electoral votes) that has been carried by the Republican candidate consistently over the last half-dozen or so Presidential elections. The Republicans have something like 209 electoral votes they considered reliable, but as the demographics of this country shift, several states that that have been consistently carried by the Republican party are now turning purple and will likely shift to blue in the not too distant future. Will’s observation is that Texas is likely to shift blue soon, and if it does so that would give Democrats more than 270 predictable votes they can rely on, assuring a Democratic President in future elections unless and until we have another seismic shift in demographics.

The main driver in this shift of course is the increasing size of the Hispanic voting populace. It should have been possible for Republicans to appeal to the Hispanic voter, or at least carve off enough for the Republican side that Hispanics don’t vote as a bloc. But it seems they’ve missed the opportunity. I find it particularly ironic that this past race has called into such stark relief how badly the Trump campaign has damaged the Republican prospects for the future by alienating the Hispanic community. He started out by claiming that “Mexicans were sending rapists” across the border, along with a few who were “probably good people,” or so he assumed. This statement was incredibly offensive to Hispanics and obviously Mexicans in particular; in one statement he alienated the fastest-growing voter bloc in the US. When he became the Republican nominee and the party got in line behind their candidate (or at least some did, albeit as they held their noses), they sent a message to the Hispanic bloc that the Republican Party felt they could win elections without them.

I wrote in previous posts that I thought the situation the Republican party finds itself in today (with practically open revolt against the party leadership) can be traced back to the events following the shellacking of Goldwater in 1964 and the desire to stay relevant. By recasting itself as the party of the “regular guy,” they backed themselves into a corner that is only now becoming apparent. And in the ‘90’s, with Newt Gingrich’s scorched earth tactics, any chance of forming consensus or even negotiating in good faith with Democrats went out the window.

They have very likely consigned themselves to near-insignificance by misjudging their base. If the Republican party is to stay relevant (or recapture the respect of their constituency), they will have to go back to the drawing board. Our country is changing, and the Republicans will once again need to appeal to a broader group; hopefully this time they will attempt to include minorities (who will shortly no longer be a “minority”) and women.

If Texas turns blue as expected in the near future, it will likely be largely because of Trump’s arrogance and stupidity. I wonder if he sees the irony.

Somehow, I kind of doubt it.