In a fascinating article in the National Review, writer Henry Olsen reported on the latest data on how the blue state exodus could impact the electoral map - and it’s bullish for Republicans.
Quoting the Brennan Center for Justice, Olsen notes their findings that the blue state exodus would cause states Biden won in 2020 to lose a net 12 seats in the House of Representatives to States that Trump won (during the 2030 Congressional reapportionment), while two seats would be moved from swing states Michigan and Pennsylvania to swing states Arizona and Georgia.
A breakdown can be seen below:
He adds, regarding how this shift will impact voters:
One might worry that migrants from blue states are bringing their politics with them, endangering the GOP’s hold on their destinations. That’s possible, but the data thus far show the exact opposite: Republican strength has been rising in destination states since the pandemic migrations, not falling.
Florida is an excellent example. When Biden took office, Democrats had a 97,000-person lead in voter registration. Today, Republicans have a massive 698,000-person lead, which is growing every month. What was once an archetypal swing state is now clearly turning red.
Other states that are expected to gain House seats show similar trends. North Carolina remains a light-red state, and its Democratic voter-registration plurality has shrunk from 374,000 to 194,000 during Biden’s presidency. Democrats have lost more than 56,000 registered voters in Arizona over the past year despite the state’s population explosion.
A report from the Heritage Foundation in 2015 found that 1,000 people on net are moving from blue states to red states - and that was just the beginning.
The latest census data from 2022-24 showed red states Texas picking seeing population growth of 473,543, Florida 365,205, and North Carolina 139,526. On the top ten list, only two states are blue, Virginia and Colorado, while two are purple (Georgia and Arizona). However, adding up the population growth of those four states is a combined 255,907, only 54% of how much population added.
Eight states lost population, including the usual suspects, blue states California, Hawaii, Illinois, New York, and Oregon. Swing state Pennsylvania also makes the list. The only blue states on the list are Louisiana and West Virginia - but those people are leaving to live in other red states - not places like California.
However, there are some tricks that Democrats have up their sleeves to offset this.
A lesser known fact about Congressional apportionment is that while it’s based on the population every state has - including legal immigrants who aren’t yet citizens, and illegal aliens. While Democrats have long wanted to convert illegals into a reliable Democrat voting block with amnesty, the reality is they’re already able to slightly rig apportionment in their favor through illegal aliens. A study from the Center for Immigration Studies estimated that 26 House seats were shifted from the 2020 census due to the inclusion of legal residents and illegal aliens in the population, with 24 of the seats lost from states that voted for Trump in 2016 - 19 of which will go to solidly blue states such as California, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Illinois.
Matt Palumbo is the author of Fact-Checking the Fact-Checkers: How the Left Hijacked and Weaponized the Fact-Checking Industry and The Man Behind the Curtain: Inside the Secret Network of George Soros
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