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And in a lot of the Oakland County suburbs, it's really 50/50 Dem/Rep split in most areas. Oakland County used to be bright red in the 1990s, but it's turning blue very quickly. A lot of it is the demographics of who's been moving in and who's been moving out.
I live in an extremely conservative area of the county and one of the only areas where the Republican Rep/State Senator didn't get rejected in the last election. It was by design that I moved into a place that was 70% Republican (at this point in history). Most areas in Oakland County simply aren't this conservative anymore.
And citidata18 is right about Macomb County. Liberals here are more union/working class - which is a different breed of liberal than the intellectual coastal Liberal.
A lot of them will vote Dem unless the R's give them a reason to vote for their candidates. Trump was an anomaly in that he talked a lot about working class people and trade. He knew his audience in Michigan and Hillary simply didn't run the right campaign here. Had she campaigned like a midwestern Dem, it would have been an easy win. We have two Dem Senators and that isn't going to change anytime in the near future. She ran the wrong campaign.
Southern Macomb County would be Republican if the social stuff was what motivated these voters, but it's not. It's jobs, jobs, jobs.
Also, Michigan voted for both Bernie and Trump in their respective primaries which tells you a lot about how traditional candidates from both parties are viewed here.
Most people here are really quite moderate and "live and let live".
As a large American city, I would say San Diego is and has been pretty moderate for a long time. There are large patches of middle and upper-middle class suburbia that lean right and the military population, active and retired, keeps it more balanced.
I think the current administration's rhetoric has really turned people away from the Republican party here locally. Being the safest and one of the most diverse big cities in America right here on the border, it can be seen by locals as disingenuous to stigmatize people of color or manufacture a border crisis to divert attention from more important national, regional, and local issues.
Frankly our biggest local issue in San Diego is unaffordable housing, growing income inequality and low wages, poor infrastructure and transit, traffic , environmental pollution (internal and external), and dealing with the impacts of climate change (e.g. wildfires). Many of these issues have similar solutions, except that the administration really only seems to worry about a border wall.
The fixation with the wall and immigrants is straight out of a Nazi Germany and is not a priority, locally or nationally. I don't see a future for the Republican party in this once conservative military town.
But Iowa is not a city. You may have a case for Des Moines (I don't know personally).
I suppose the OP was looking for a city. Des Moines leans left of center. It's really the rural parts of eastern and central Iowa that embody that purple mentality. They aren't beating down the door for social progress, but they believe in public investement in roads, schools, hospitals, etc. Western Iowa is pure Red. They would vote for Satan over Jesus Christ if Satan ran as a Republican.
As a large American city, I would say San Diego is and has been pretty moderate for a long time. There are large patches of middle and upper-middle class suburbia that lean right and the military population, active and retired, keeps it more balanced.
I think the current administration's rhetoric has really turned people away from the Republican party here locally. Being the safest and one of the most diverse big cities in America right here on the border, it can be seen by locals as disingenuous to stigmatize people of color or manufacture a border crisis to divert attention from more important national, regional, and local issues.
Frankly our biggest local issue in San Diego is unaffordable housing, growing income inequality and low wages, poor infrastructure and transit, traffic , environmental pollution (internal and external), and dealing with the impacts of climate change (e.g. wildfires). Many of these issues have similar solutions, except that the administration really only seems to worry about a border wall.
The fixation with the wall and immigrants is straight out of a Nazi Germany and is not a priority, locally or nationally. I don't see a future for the Republican party in this once conservative military town.
The same thing with Orange county I guess we can say it's a moderate place since it went full blue in 18. The conservatives are still there though. If it wasn't for LA county SoCal would be a red place, but with 10 million in LA county that won't happen.
The same thing with Orange county I guess we can say it's a moderate place since it went full blue in 18. The conservatives are still there though. If it wasn't for LA county SoCal would be a red place, but with 10 million in LA county that won't happen.
It's pretty unfortunate, as someone who identifies as mostly moderate. I personally am vehemently opposed to one-party states like what we have in California because the party decides policy/candidates instead of the people. That's simply not democracy.
Unfortunately, the Republican Party continues to shift towards Deep South conservatism and that simply won't do in coastal California. California Republicans are too educated and well-off to be deceived by idiotic, unintelligent rhetoric aimed at the ignorant masses. Also, talks of trying to overturn Roe v. Wade, reducing taxes on the super rich to the lowest level since the '30s, etc. are a total turn-off generally.
Both parties are out of touch with voters and just need to die off. I'm hoping the "Socialist Democrat" or "Liberal Democrat" left wing of the Democrats create their own party. The current Republican party needs to wither away and a new moderate part form in its place.
Many people I know in the Baltimore suburbs were very conservative when it comes to BLM, crime, unfair trade agreements, overtaxation, illegal immigration and Obamacare but are less conservative than the Deep South when it comes to abortion and gay marriage.
I'd say the white population of Baton Rouge within the city is mostly moderate Republican with more conservative Republican in the suburbs. In New Orleans the suburbs are mostly moderate Republican compared to the heavily Democrat city and the more conservative Republican exurbs. Many middle class white people in Louisiana wish Trump was classier but still agree with his policies and can't imagine voting for a Democratic party that's become so far left.
There are many dichotomies in the Deep South that might surprise people from elsewhere for example I know people who are gay and support gay rights but who also are otherwise conservative - pro police, support keeping the Confederate monuments, want the wall built. Also many blacks who are extremely against abortion and gay marriage but are liberal when it comes to police, the death penalty, Obamacare, Medicaid expansion, etc.
But they weren't moderates; they were conservatives. I remember that time very well.
Moderates tend to be those who no longer are affiliated with either of the two polarized parties. Since there is no strong third party, and only the tired old blue and red metrics / graphics, there's no way to accurately show this other group. The two parties love this, to deemphasize the third/moderate group, and to maintain their polar stronghold. Sure, a mixture of blue and red next to each other gives clues, but a true three party approach (with color scheme) would show matters much clearer.
There's still moderate Republicans vs conservative Republicans (compare white voters in the New Orleans suburbs with white voters in rural Louisiana), and there's still a couple moderate Democrats left vs left wing Democrats (a West Virginia Democrat from coal country vs a liberal yuppie from Pelosi's San Francisco district).
New Hampshire and Maine is politically "moderate" soil. The states are more fiscally moderate/conservative and socially moderate/progressive. Portland, ME is quite progressive itself, but I think you would find moderate feeling towns in its suburbs. Manchester, NH was quite purple in 2016 while leaning toward Hillary.
I think some of the smaller Upper Midwest cities would also have a "moderate" feeling, such as Green Bay and Des Moines.
As a side note, I take issue with the term "moderate." You are taking two political poles that are centered by a lot of (false) assumptions about how the world/politics must work. These assumptions are rooted in historical injustices and hegemonies. As a trite example, from FDR until Reagan, the top marginal income tax rate hovered between 70 and 90 percent. Since the dawn of Reaganism and "trickle down" economics, we've dipped into 30s and 40s. So today, a political conservative might be pushing 30s, a moderate 40s, and a progressive such as AOC to start working back toward 70%. Yet that 70% was once a moderate or conservative approach.
Obviously, my example is a bit over simplified. My point is that I think we need to stop deploying this term moderate as if it is sanctimonious to find "common ground" or a compromise in a political landscape that is economically neoliberal and normalizing of a president that states an overwhelming number of intentional falsehoods to gaslight his citizens. We are so far right in this country at this moment that anything "moderate" is still conservative and anything considered progressive is at best moderate.
I digress, but I think it is important for the purpose of discussion to rethink some of the assumptions embedded in the term "moderate."
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