Why is Mount Greenwood, Chicago so conservative?

[Suburbia]

The Staten Island/Bay Ridge/Bensonhurst of Chicago is Mount Greenwood, Chicago, a white ethnic middle class neighborhood in Chicago, Illinois.

Mount Greenwood is 86% white, 3% black, 6% Latino.

Mount Greenwood is home to blue collar police officers, firefighters, and blue collar union members.

Mount Greenwood voted for Republican Donald Trump in 2016 and voted for Republican Mitt Romney in 2012.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Greenwood,_Chicago

https://web.archive.org/web/20170317144802/https://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/numbers/president-vice-president-every-neighborhood-map-election-results-voting-general-primary-illinois

https://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/mount-greenwood-worst-neighborhood/Content?oid=37061161

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Paging you Greenline and Illiniwek!

[Mr. Illini]

OP detailed why. Portions of Staten Island are just as if not more conservative. It's not fair to compare the whole island - an entire borough - to a small Chicago neighborhood. Mt Greenwood's ward didn't even go to Trump - all of SI did.

Mt Greenwood will support Democrats if they are of their brand. Pat Quinn is popular there. The Daleys were extremely popular there.

Mt Greenwood's story of becoming Republican is the same story that we see across the country in traditionally Democratic WWC areas. This one just happens to be in a big Democratic city, so it sticks out especially.

[cinyc]

OP detailed why. Portions of Staten Island are just as if not more conservative. It's not fair to compare the whole island - an entire borough - to a small Chicago neighborhood. Mt Greenwood's ward didn't even go to Trump - all of SI did.

That's false. The North Shore of Staten Island didn't vote Trump. It is not as monolithic as you think.

[RFayette]

OP detailed why. Portions of Staten Island are just as if not more conservative. It's not fair to compare the whole island - an entire borough - to a small Chicago neighborhood. Mt Greenwood's ward didn't even go to Trump - all of SI did.

That's false. The North Shore of Staten Island didn't vote Trump. It is not as monolithic as you think.

I think Mr. Illini is just saying that Staten Island as a whole - a much larger area than just Mount Greenwood - voted for Trump, while Mount Greenwood is a comparatively very small pocket, not saying that Staten Island is monolithically right-leaning.

[Tintrlvr]

Mt Greenwood's story of becoming Republican is the same story that we see across the country in traditionally Democratic WWC areas. This one just happens to be in a big Democratic city, so it sticks out especially.

FTR, I don't think Mt. Greenwood was ever a Democratic area, at least not in the last few decades. Same as Staten Island. You are right that Staten Island includes some areas that are much more Republican (as high as the 70% range in some places) than Mt. Greenwood.

[VPH]

The interesting thing about Mount Greenwood is that Lipinski always carries it while it votes Republican for President and for other offices. In the 2018 primary, it was one of Lipinski's strongest areas against Newman. Also went for Kennedy for the Gubernatorial race. The poster who said it was similar to Bay Ridge/Bensonhurst is on the money. Also, Bridesburg in Philadelphia exemplifies this trend.

1. Mount Greenwood is a heavily Irish Catholic neighborhood, It's very conservative in values.
2. There's a heavy law enforcement presence, so Blue Lives Matter rhetoric from the right has made it even more right-leaning. There was a battle between Black Lives Matter protestors and Blue Lives Matter counterprotestors some years ago.
3. Mount Greenwood has been hostile to outsiders in the past. It's quite closed off from the rest of the city, and on its edge, so similar to some other insular White ethnic urban neighborhoods, it's more conservative for that reason.
4. Personalistic politics seems to dominate these tightly-knit areas. Hence the ticket splitting to vote for Lipinski and Kennedy. My impression is that these neighborhoods are the last stand of the old-school political machines.

[Green Line]

Chicago has residency requirements for city workers.  If you are a policeman, fireman, CPS employee you have to live within the city limits..  The last remaining white southsiders are clustering in MTG and to a lesser extent Beverly and Midway because its the last place to go.

If the requirement is ever lifted this neighborhood will flip faster than you can imagine.