Red States Getting Redder

By: John Hinderaker — February 23^rd 2024 at 19:29

(John Hinderaker)

The Great Sort is under way, as normal people move to red states and liberals move to blue states. (That last is hypothetical and hasn’t actually been observed.) When massive numbers began leaving blue states like California and New York for red states like Texas and Florida, many conservatives worried that those blue staters might bring their bad voting habits with them. Happily, that doesn’t seem to have happened.

This Wall Street Journal story is headlined: “Blue-State Residents Streamed Into South Carolina. Here’s Why It Stayed Ruby Red.” But it deals with more than one state:

A Wall Street Journal analysis of census data found that a third of [South Carolina’s] new residents between 2017 and 2021 hailed from blue states and a quarter from red ones, according to census data. …

Yet the new arrivals are disproportionately Republican. Estimates from the nonpartisan voter file vendor L2 suggest about 57% of voters who moved to South Carolina during that time are Republicans, while about 36% are Democrats and 7% are independents. That places them roughly in line with recent statewide votes in South Carolina.

It shouldn’t be surprising that when conservatives leave liberal states, they likely will move to conservative ones. The same thing is happening in states other than South Carolina:

The Palmetto State is a prime example of why a yearslong wave of migration to the South has largely failed to change its partisan tint. Many people who leave blue states are Republicans gravitating toward a more politically favorable new home.

In Florida, for instance, 48% of people who moved there between 2017 and 2021 came from blue states while 29% came from red states, Census figures show. Among those who registered to vote, 44% are Republicans, 25% are Democrats and 28% are nonpartisan, according to L2 data. Texas also has a heavier flow of newcomers from blue states but a greater share who L2 data estimates are Republican.

There is much more at the link; it is fun to see Democrats try to spin the numbers:

McDougald Scott and other South Carolina Democratic officials are working to target these new voters and persuade them to vote Democratic by focusing on issues like education…

I live in a blue state (for the time being, anyway) where the public schools are almost unbelievably bad. To be fair, though, the schools in New York and California are likely worse.

…infrastructure…

Have these people never driven on a highway in California?

and healthcare…

What about healthcare? Most people get health insurance through their jobs, and jobs are much more plentiful in red states. Blue states spend incomprehensible amounts of money on Medicaid, but that isn’t exactly a magnet for desirable new inhabitants.

…which she believes the Republicans are neglecting.

Apparently millions of Americans who are moving from blue to red states do not agree. Perhaps this is what it comes down to:

She said South Carolina’s limited access to abortion—which is banned at six weeks of pregnancy—is also something that crosses party lines.

Right. Hey, blue state economies may suck, crime may be rampant, taxes may be too high, government may be corrupt–but if the occasion arises, you can always kill your baby. This is the sales pitch my state’s liberal government is actually trying to implement: come here to get an abortion or a sex change operation, especially if you are a kid! Somehow, it doesn’t seem to be working.

The bottom line is that the Great Sort continues to benefit Red America. The question is, to what extent is the out-migration of normals locking liberalism into the blue states?