The Geography of Racially Polarized Voting: Calibrating Surveys at the District Level

Voting in the United States has long been known to divide sharply along racial lines, and the degree of racially polarized voting evidently varies across regions, and even within a state. Researchers have further studied variation in racially polarized voting using aggregate data techniques, but these methods assume that variation in individual preferences is not related to geography. This paper presents estimates based on individual level data of the extent and variation in racially polarized voting across US Congressional Districts. Leveraging large, geocoded sample surveys, we develop an improved method for measuring racial voting patterns at the Congressional District-level. The method overcomes challenges in previous attempts of survey modeling by allowing survey data to inform the synthetic population model. This method has sufficient power to provide precise estimates of racial polarization even when survey data are sparse. We find that variation across districts but within states explains roughly 20 percent of the total variation; states explain a further 20 percent of the total variation, and 55 percent of the variation is simply national differences between races. The Deep South still has the highest racial polarization between White and Black voters, but some Midwestern congressional districts exhibit comparably high polarization. The polarization between White and Hispanic voters is far more variable than between Black and White voters.

Minmaxing of Bayesian Improved Surname Geocoding and Geography Level Ups in Predicting Race

Racial identification is a critical factor in understanding a multitude of important outcomes in many fields. However, inferring an individual’s race from ecological data is prone to bias and error. This process was only recently improved via Bayesian improved surname geocoding (BISG). With surname and geographic-based demographic data, it is possible to more accurately estimate individual racial identification than ever before. However, the level of geography used in this process varies widely. Whereas some existing work makes use of geocoding to place individuals in precise census blocks, a substantial portion either skips geocoding altogether or relies on estimation using surname or county-level analyses. Presently, the trade-offs of such variation are unknown. In this letter, we quantify those trade-offs through a validation of BISG on Georgia’s voter file using both geocoded and nongeocoded processes and introduce a new level of geography—ZIP codes—to this method. We find that when estimating the racial identification of White and Black voters, nongeocoded ZIP code-based estimates are acceptable alternatives. However, census blocks provide the most accurate estimations when imputing racial identification for Asian and Hispanic voters. Our results document the most efficient means to sequentially conduct BISG analysis to maximize racial identification estimation while simultaneously minimizing data missingness and bias.

Larger Democratic swings in United States counties with Black Lives Matter protests in preliminary results of the 2020 presidential election

Media commentary has suggested that recent Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests, particularly riots, drove voters, particularly Hispanic voters, away from Democratic candidate Joe Biden in the 2020 US presidential election. I test these hypotheses with county-level regression models of 2016-to-2020 swing towards the Democratic presidential candidate, using the presence and intensity of BLM non-riot protests and riots as regressors, controlling for state and many background demographic factors (population density, household size, racial composition, etc.). The models (generalized additive models) that control most aggressively for background factors find small and positive associations between BLM protests and Democratic swing: counties with non-riot BLM protests swung more towards Joe Biden by 0.2 percentage points, and counties with BLM-associated riots swung more towards Joe Biden by (a statistically insignificant) 0.1 percentage points. The extra BLM-protest swing was not statistically significantly different in counties with relatively many Hispanic voting-age citizens, although it was weaker in counties with relatively many Asian voting-age citizens. Inasmuch as these results reflect causal impacts of BLM protests, the protests enhanced the Democratic swing but were probably not electorally decisive. My most elaborate model suggests that a lack of BLM protests in 2020 would have flipped only one state: Biden might have narrowly lost Arizona.

The integrative force of political institutions? Direct democracy and voter turnout across ethnic and nativity groups

Much has been written on the positive effect of direct democracy (initiatives, referendums) on voter turnout. However, we have limited knowledge about potential differential effects on voters belonging to various ethnic groups. The paper argues that depending on a group’s responsiveness to the political context, direct democracy can (dis-)integrate voters (from) into the electorate. Empirical analysis of Current Population Survey (CPS) voting supplement survey data, together with data on the absolute use of direct democracy across US states, corroborates this theoretical expectation, however lending more support for the disintegrating assumption. Frequent direct democratic elections further widen the negative voting gap between first-generation Asian voters and voters living in the US for three generations or longer, whereas they tend to diminish this voting gap for first-generation Hispanic voters. The disintegrative pattern for first-generation Asian voters remains even significant when excluding California from the state sample, yet not the integrative tendency for first-generation Hispanics. Additional analyses using alternative measures of direct democracy and voting, and applying statistical adjustments to address causality concerns, confirm the robustness of these findings, which shed light on the so-far underexplored (dis-)integrative potential of political institutions.

Do Voters Prefer Just Any Descriptive Representative? The Case of Multiracial Candidates

Although scholars of representation have examined variation in voter support conditional on shared demographic traits, we know little about how voters respond to candidates who belong to multiple racial categories. Multiracial candidates challenge how we think about and study representation. I theorize that multiracial categories provide mixed information about how well a candidate adheres to group norms of identity, resulting in a multiracial advantage across groups, but a disadvantage within groups. A conjoint survey experiment on 786 White, Black, Asian, and Hispanic voters and a separate analysis of support for a multiracial candidate in a real-world election support these claims. Thus, multiracial candidates have the advantage of building coalitions with voters from other groups, but they are disadvantaged when appealing to co-racials with strong racial identities. These findings demonstrate that future research on representation must engage multiracial elites.

A Look Ahead at the 2020 US Elections: The Role of Candidate Diversity in Political Participation

An increasingly diverse population in the United States has given rise to a growing body of literature that analyzes the causes and consequences of descriptive representation. Using individual-level representative data on registration and voting for the entire United States over the 2008-2018 decade, we find that diversity in the candidate pool promotes the registration and voting of eligible-to-vote individuals, particularly those belonging to the youngest generations of voters, those located in swing states, and growing minorities, as in the case of Hispanic voters. Given the changing electorate, increasing candidate diversity might prove crucial in promoting political and electoral engagement.

“Family Values Don’t Stop at the Rio Grande . . .”: Can the Republican Party Convert Hispanic Voters?

As the Hispanic community becomes increasingly important in American politics there are competing views about whether they can be converted to the Republican Party. One perspective argues that Hispanics’ religion and traditional social values makes them natural constituents of the Republican Party. Alternatively, Hispanics are primarily concerned about issues promoting their well-being and topics such as moral values or religion are private. We use a novel approach to test whether traditional social values might attract Hispanic voters to the Republican Party. Using exit poll results for ballot propositions on moral issues from Arizona, Colorado, and Florida we find weak evidence that traditional values will convert Hispanics to the Republican Party. Instead, our results indicate that traditional social values issues reinforce the polarization between the two parties.

Why Would Hispanics Vote for Trump? Explaining the Controversy of the 2016 Election

Donald Trump was particularly vocal in shaping his presidential campaign around policies perceived as being anti-immigration. Consequently, many were shocked that Hispanic support for the Republican Party did not drop in the 2016 presidential election. In fact, our survey, which consisted of 1,080 people of Hispanic descent living in the United States, found that 74% of Hispanic Trump voters were in favor of generally deporting all illegal immigrants. Our results suggest that the population of Hispanics who voted in the 2016 presidential election was, on average, more conservative than the overall population of Hispanics living in the United States. Furthermore, our analysis suggests that issues such as the economy, health care, and education were more important to Hispanic voters than were issues related to immigration.

Introduction

This book is an examination of how the Trump campaign won Floridain 2016. Florida, a perennial battleground state, was a microcosm of hisnational victory. Trump secured suburban and Republican voters thatmany thought would abandon him; white voters overwhelming supportedhim; and even Hispanic voters cast some ballots for the controversial candidate.With Election Day expectations overturned, there is still a sense ofshock at the chaos that has continued from the campaign into Trump’sadministration. While few have been able to successfully predict anythingabout the 2016 presidential election and the ensuing administration, we hopeto provide a thorough explanation of what happened and why.