Curious, what caused NY and CT became so liberal now (especially LI/Suburbs)

[Johnmayerfan]

My questions is what caused NY and especially CT shift from swing/red to solid blue now, especially with the poor economy there, GOP still got shellacked every election.

1) NY was a swing state until 1988 on national level, what caused the Long Island and Westchester suburbs to became so blue, demographics? Especially the affluent Westchester county.

2) Those areas still had way more registered R than D as recently as in 2004, yet Bush never got amount of R voters there? A lot people just don't vote?

3) Did a lot of people moved out of NY, is that why politics there changed?

As for Connecticut, a lot of people works on wall street lives there, yet Romney did very poorly in the state, even Trump performed better. Even Bush in 2004 got 44 percent.

1) What happened to those Bush 41/Reagan voters in CT?

2) Did a lot of R voters moved out of state?

[Starpaul20]

I don't know the real reasons, but I suspect it has something to do with the GOP's lurch towards Social Conservative/"Culture War" issues in the last 20-25 years. Many of the Republicans in the northeast (especially the affluent ones) tend to be socially moderate if not socially liberal.

[This is Eharding, guys]

Connecticut and New York were both in the top 15 best states for McGovern and top 10 worst states for Goldwater. Simple enough.

[Nyvin]

The inner suburbs gradually integrated better with the inner cities.

[AN63093]

I'll have some more thoughts on this later (once I've fully formed them in my mind, that is), but as someone who grew up in NY and is very familiar with the NJ suburbs, Westchester, Fairfield CT, Long Island and so on.. one initial thought.

And that is, one must be careful not to group all these areas into one basket and then generalize.  Westchester and Nassau, for example, are two different places, which one may not realize by just looking at them superficially and determining that they are both generally affluent NYC suburbs.  This does reveal itself in voting patterns as well.  Compare, for example, swing and trend.  Westchester had a D swing and strong D trend in '16.  Nassau actually swung R and just barely had a D trend.  If you go back through elections you'll notice this is something of a pattern, Nassau will both swing and trend more R on the whole.

Or narrowing in even further, different towns will have different demographics and also tend to have different "reputations" (for lack of better word) in the tri-state area.  Compare Scarsdale, NY with a place like Darien, CT.  Or even within Westchester, Scarsdale vs. a town like Bronxville or Larchmont.  This may reveal itself in differing attitudes and political views among populations in different towns... although, it should be noted that there has been quite a bit of "leveling out" over the years, such that the differences aren't as great as they used to be.  For example, much, if not most, of Fairfield Cty CT is now "new money," especially when compared to 50 years ago.

[King of Kensington]

^ Westchester is more "establishment" than Nassau.

[Smash255]

Many affluent voters in the NYC suburbs tend to be socially moderate to liberal as was mentioned above.  This led to a sharp Democratic trend during the 90's and into 2000.   There was a bit of a pullback to the right in many of the NYC suburbs after 9/11, although Westchester didn't really move much.   Part of that could be the WWC voters might have been more inclined to have their voting habits impacted by 9/11..  The region didn't move much over the next decade, Westchester then moved further left last year, Suffolk lurched right, meanwhile Nassau barely moved (and has been between Dem 5.6 and Dem 8.4) in each of the last four Presidential races. 

[Smash255]

^ Westchester is more "establishment" than Nassau.

Westchester has significantly fewer WWC voters than Nassau, and Nassau has significantly fewer WWC voters than Suffolk.

[AN63093]

I would suppose that's generally accurate, but I would still hesitate to generalize too broadly.  After all, you have Sands Point, Cove Neck, and other places like that in Nassau, and in Westchester you got Yonkers.

On the average though, you may be right.  Both counties are heavily "new money" though, even if Westchester may have a reputation of being "more established."

[Smash255]

I would suppose that's generally accurate, but I would still hesitate to generalize too broadly.  After all, you have Sands Point, Cove Neck, and other places like that in Nassau, and in Westchester you got Yonkers.

On the average though, you may be right.  Both counties are heavily "new money" though, even if Westchester may have a reputation of being "more established."

By no means was I suggesting that Nassau has a large WWC population (I live here so I  know its not the case) or that Westchester has none, but rather Westchester's WWC population is smaller than Nassau's, and Nassau's is smaller than Suffolk's.    All three flew leftward during the 90's in part due to Clinton combined with the GOP's uber social conservative direction.  The WWC vote in each area might explain the changes since then, especially in regards to the aftermath of 9/11, and the Trump era/

[AN63093]

Yes, I understood you, and I agree.

My post was intended as further elaboration building off your post for the reader that was not familiar with the region.  Addressing it to "you" was inelegant writing on my part.

[King of Kensington]

With Trump on the ballot, the GOP vote went down in Westchester and Fairfield, up in Suffolk and remained more or less the same in Nassau.

[All Along The Watchtower]

^ Westchester is more "establishment" than Nassau.

There definitely seems to be a divide between places that were bedroom communities for the Social Register types as far back as more than a century ago and areas that were specifically constructed as "family-friendly" suburbs for post-WWII white-flighters.

[choclatechip45]

I live and grew up in Fairfield County people care more about social issues than economic ones. It's the reason why most republicans who run statewide are pro choice. People care about identity politics. I remember in 2010 when I canvasesed for Jim Himes people were so confused why Himes support for Pelosi was seen as a negative. It was pretty funny that the republicans were so clueless on how to attack him.

[seb_pard]

I think is a mix of a high percentage of people who works in finance and media (two industries in which a more socially liberal message attract), a sizable jewish population, a constant influx of migrants (and due to the heterogeneous origins of the new entrants, the nature of politics is not polar) and off course NYC is a magnet to people who are into the "counterculture", I don't think many stay forever in the city, and most probably settle in the suburbs, but probably many of them maintain their ideology. Also, from what I know the union membership rate is high in the area.

At the end the thing is that the message that democrats started to develop in the 90's appealed to certain groups that are very numerous in the NY Metro area.

[King of Kensington]

What role do transplants play in all this?  It seems that transplants who move to NYC suburbs prefer Westchester, Connecticut and New Jersey and generally avoid Long Island which has a more "insular" reputation.