What Went Down During The 2021 Elections

Youngkin is the official winner in Virginia’s gubernatorial race, thanks to him beating his benchmarks across the more populous areas of the state. Youngkin overperformed across most of the state’s eastern counties and cities, which drove the highest proportions of the statewide vote in the 2020 presidential election. Those pink counties in the southwest corner of the state are relatively smaller, rural GOP-friendly areas — so even though McAuliffe did relatively better there, GOP margins were still quite large. Any improvement compared to Biden’s 2020 results weren’t enough to offset Youngkin’s overperformance in more populous suburban areas.

As you wave at, Jacob, there’s already some chatter that the Republican upset in Texas’s special election runoff tonight might foreshadow large GOP gains in south Texas next year. As Geoffrey and I have written before, Hispanic voters trending further right in metro areas, specifically, could be an obstacle for Democrats — especially if Republicans continue to make inroads with Hispanic voters here and voters along the border, too. As such, it was already in Texas Republicans’ best interest to improve their margins in Hispanic communities in more populous areas (like HD-118) that lean Democratic.

One group we haven’t heard too much about tonight are Latino voters, who shifted toward Trump in 2020. But a special election taking place in Texas tonight might shed some light on whether those shifts have staying power. This is a state House race in a district where 73 percent of residents are Hispanic, and where former Rep. Beto O’Rourke won by 20 points in 2018 and Biden won by 14 points in 2020.