Virginia Will Test Democratic Gains With Highly Educated Voters
Perhaps the most dominant electoral trend of the Trump presidency was education polarization — voters with a bachelor’s degree or higher have become more Democratic, while those without a college degree have become more Republican.
And Virginia is a highly educated state — about 40 percent of Virginians 25 years or older have a bachelor’s degree or higher compared with 33 percent of the nation as a whole. So as highly educated voters have trended Democratic, so too has the commonwealth. Virginia voted for Obama by 4 points in 2012, Clinton by 5 points in 2016 and Biden by 10 points in 2020.
Virginia will, therefore, be a good first test of whether Democratic gains with highly educated voters will continue now that Trump is no longer president. Three counties in particular to watch are Fairfax, Prince William and Loudoun: They’re among the most-populous localities and have large shares of college-educated voters.
Democrats won Fairfax County by 22 points in the 2013 gubernatorial election but won it by 37 points in the 2017 gubernatorial election. In Prince William County, the Democratic margin increased from 8 points in 2013 to 23 points in 2017. And in Loudoun County, the Democratic margin increased from 4 points in 2013 to 20 points in 2017.
As we watch the returns tonight, these three counties (and others) may give us important clues about the degree to which education polarization is continuing after the Trump presidency.