W Texas voting trends (Houston, Yoakum: house, construction, moving to)

[bman15470]

Noticed that some west Texas county's like Yoakum and Dawson county's are 50% or more Hispanic population and yet those county's vote 70-80% republican. That seems to fly in the face of similarly populated demographics in south Texas county's. What are your thoughts on this?

[Lucidus]

Its the beginning of a long nightmare for the Democrats. They have always assumed that they can take Hispanic votes for granted and have been counting their chickens before they've hatched, hell they have been counting their chickens before they even have the eggs.

Not so long ago Texas was solidly Democratic, but the first areas to start going Republican were in the west. Now we see that history repeating with a solidly Democrat Hispanic population starting to realign to the Republicans and the change is most evident but not limited to west Texas, just ask Solomon Ortiz.

[Sandstorm214]

Originally Posted by Lucidus

Its the beginning of a long nightmare for the Democrats. They have always assumed that they can take Hispanic votes for granted and have been counting their chickens before they've hatched, hell they have been counting their chickens before they even have the eggs.

Not so long ago Texas was solidly Democratic, but the first areas to start going Republican were in the west. Now we see that history repeating with a solidly Democrat Hispanic population starting to realign to the Republicans and the change is most evident but not limited to west Texas, just ask Solomon Ortiz.

It's not the "beginning" of anything. Republicans have held eveything in this state for over a decade and this state has voted Republican for Senate and President for two decades. It's certainly not that Hispanics are voting Republican--as a demographic, they just don't vote in Texas in the same percentage that they do in states like California. Hispanics are not in any way aligning themselves with Republicans--as a demographic, Republicans have been losing ground with Hispanics for some time in Texas. There is not evidence to indicate that this is changing. As I said earlier, Hispanics just aren't voting.

[Lucidus]

Originally Posted by Sandstorm214

It's not the "beginning" of anything. Republicans have held eveything in this state for over a decade and this state has voted Republican for Senate and President for two decades. It's certainly not that Hispanics are voting Republican--as a demographic, they just don't vote in Texas in the same percentage that they do in states like California. Hispanics are not in any way aligning themselves with Republicans--as a demographic, Republicans have been losing ground with Hispanics for some time in Texas. There is not evidence to indicate that this is changing. As I said earlier, Hispanics just aren't voting.

I disagree, there is some evidence. Consider for example that according to exit polling, Hispanics made up a larger portion of the electorate in 2010 than 2006 (15% and 17% respectively) in Texas, but Republicans did much better in 2010 including picking up seats in TX-27 an TX-23 that have large Hispanic majorities (66% and 72% Hispanic) . I think it would be unlikely that the tiny population of Anglos in those districts could cast more votes than the large Hispanic majorities.

[Sandstorm214]

I'd be interested to see your source for those numbers. According to this article in the Chronicle, Hispanic voter turnout was down significantly this year.

Across Texas, Latinos gave GOP a boost in midterm vote | Houston & Texas News | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

The only "boost" they gave Republicans was not turning out to vote, especially in heavily Hispanic districts.

[Lucidus]

Originally Posted by Sandstorm214

I'd be interested to see your source for those numbers. According to this article in the Chronicle, Hispanic voter turnout was down significantly this year.

Across Texas, Latinos gave GOP a boost in midterm vote | Houston & Texas News | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

The only "boost" they gave Republicans was not turning out to vote, especially in heavily Hispanic districts.

I was comparing 2006 to 2010 since both are midterms.

CNN.com - Elections 2006

Senate, House, Governor Races - Election Center 2010 - Elections & Politics from CNN.com

There is an interesting discussion of TX-27 in this thread at swingstate:

Swing State Project: TX-27: Ortiz Concedes to Farenthold

Read some of the comments.

For some strange reason . . .
Nueces County (Corpus Cristi) is shifting to the Republicans. The GOP pretty much won everything there.

Turnout
With whites being less than a quarter of TX-27 (24.2%), it is almost impossible to blame this primarily on turnout (turnout in NY-16 was half of here, yet GOP can't win ever, Serrano got 95% in D+41 district, it's the type of local Hispanics), the GOP ran some Hispanics for office at the local level.

Maybe, but even McCain won Nueces County in 2008
52% of the vote, but he still won it. The voting Hispanics here seem to be trending to the GOP

I read this right after the election.
In 2006 Republicans picked up the Nueces County County Judge and Nueces County Sheriff positions.
In 2008 Republicans reelected the sheriff to a full 4 year term with about 60% of the vote won a seat on the County Commission Precinct 1 by 179 votes to give Republicans their first majority since Reconstruction.

In 2010 the Republican county judge got reelected with 62% of the vote, swept all state house races in the county including Solomon Ortiz Jr.'s seat and elected two Hispanic Republican judges.

I think Hispanics in the panhandle are trending Republican.
The thing is that Nueces County shouldn't have voted for Bush, and it certainly shouldn't have voted for McCain.
If you look at historical patterns, Clinton won Nueces County in '96 by double-digits. Obama should've done so too. Nueces county voted for Dukakis in '88 and Carter in '80. That's the type of place Obama lost.

In fact, Obama did worse than Clinton in '96 in almost every single county in the panhandle.

It's not all turn-out; it can't be in a >70% Hispanic district.

It's not a very comforting conclusion, but I think there is powerful evidence that Texas Hispanics are moving to the right.

You can whistle past the graveyard if you want to, but clearly Hispanics in Texas are trending towards the GOP.

[bman15470]

Originally Posted by Sandstorm214

It's not the "beginning" of anything. Republicans have held eveything in this state for over a decade and this state has voted Republican for Senate and President for two decades. It's certainly not that Hispanics are voting Republican--as a demographic, they just don't vote in Texas in the same percentage that they do in states like California. Hispanics are not in any way aligning themselves with Republicans--as a demographic, Republicans have been losing ground with Hispanics for some time in Texas. There is not evidence to indicate that this is changing. As I said earlier, Hispanics just aren't voting.

Hispanics aren't voting? Yoakum county- white 51.9%, Hispanics 45.9%- 2008 election Yoakum went 81% McCain 18% Obama. Your assertion does not add up.