Number Crunching Interlude

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot of Electoral Math

I hate to step on the "New Progressivism" salon, but I've spent the last hour or so putting together a spiffy map of this week's election in Virginia, and I'm sure as heck not going to let it go to waste at this point:

This map shows that the Kaine Kilgore election represents a midpoint between the '96 vintage Clinton urban-suburban coalition and the modern Mark Warner/Paul Hackett urban-rural-smalltown coalition. Not pictured are Kaine's small but noticeable improvements in many small towns throughout Virgina: places like Williamsburg, Staunton, Lexington, Waynesboro, and Danville all showed small blue-tinted shifts in their partisan alignment.

The good news is that the Kaine campaign was able to significantly increase Partisan alignment in major Democratic enclaves; Richmond, Charlottesville, and suburban Fairfax and Arlington all showed increased Democratic performance. The great news is that Kaine was able make solid gains in suburban and exurban Virginia; three populous and fast-growing counties within a 70 mile radius of DC flipped from red to blue.

Kaine's remaining gains were limited to a slight increase in Democratic performance in the metro areas of Norfolk, Newport News, and Virginia Beach, plus aforementioned boost in the states' small towns. Places like Virginia Beach and Staunton flipped from red to blue, while the campaign held down the margin of defeat in the outer DC exurbs.

The bad news is easy to spot: Kaine lost most of Mark Warner's mojo in Southwest Virginia. Now, Jerry Kilgore is from Gate City, along the Tennessee-Virginia Border, so to some extent this outcome was expected. And despite the loss in support, Democrats managed to win a few rural counties here and there:

Still, Kaine will have to work hard to consolidate Democratic support in Southwest Virginia. As the folks over at MaxSpeak point out, control of state legislatures matters, and Democrats will need to win seats in rural Virginia in order to take back the House of Delegates. In addition, continuing to string together 51% majorities will eventually prove untenable, so building a strong cushion in Southwest Virginia or the Virgina Beach area would help the party in future elections.