Much has been made of the new look of the Washington electoral map resulting from the 2016 election. Like the national election pattern, Donald Trump won acres while Hillary Clinton won voters. Although Trump’s 37% was the lowest Republican vote for president in 20 years, he carried 27 of the state’s 39 counties. For the first time in three generations, the Republican candidate for president carried the coastal counties. The “Cascade Curtain” appears to have parted. The great divide now is urban–rural more than east-west.

There was certainly an economic component to the results here, as there was nationally: Trump won 25 of this state’s 26 least prosperous counties. Nationally, Clinton won 15% of the land mass, but 64% of the GDP. But there is more to this than the economy.

How do voters’ attitudes in counties won by Trump differ from those in counties won by Clinton? Of course, everyone knows that the red and blue maps distort reality. There are Republicans in “blue” counties and Democrats in “red” counties – a fact borne out by the finding in the April Elway Poll found that 45% of voters in Clinton counties and 44% of voters in Trump counties had been in a political argument since the election.

What are they arguing about? The April Elway Poll compared answers of voters in Trump and Clinton counties on 12 basic attitude questions. The items were broad attitudinal positions, not specific policy proposals.  We found disagreements between partisans more than between counties.

Majorities of voters in Clinton and Trump counties agreed on five of the 12 items. They were within 10 percentage points of each other on eight of the 12. In contrast, majorities of Republicans and Democrats agreed with each other on only three of the 12 items; majorities of partisans were on opposite sides of the question in six of the 12.

Republicans and Democrats disagreed with each other mostly on the role of government. Majorities disagreed about government intrusion into our daily lives; government waste; the need for government to guarantee food and shelter; and the ease of receiving government benefits. They also disagreed on environmental regulation and international trade.

Republicans and Democrats differed by degree, but not direction, on immigration, the value and role of taxes, and foreign policy. Majorities of both parties agreed on wealth inequality; political correctness and the belief that elected officials don’t care about them.

On every issue, the differences were greater between Republican and Democrats than between the Trump and Clinton counties.

One of the features of American politics is that our government is organized by geography but modern politics is organized by interest. The partisans drift further apart, but they still have to live together. The maps matter because representation is allocated geographically. To effect policy, partisans must capture territory. The battleground is in the suburbs, where partisan majorities are comparatively slim.

A generation ago, state Republicans formulated a strategy of surrounding Seattle. Give Seattle to the Democrats, and win everywhere else. That worked to elect Slade Gorton to the US Senate and other Republicans to statewide office. It doesn’t work any more. Politically, “Seattle” has expanded. The  counties in central Puget Sound – counties that contain most of the state’s voters – are dark blue. Population trends indicate that most of the growth will continue to be in those counties.

As they try to focus a strategy for winning state elections, both parties are roiling. The Democrats are still fighting the Sanders-Clinton battle. It is a clash between the organization and the energy.  Bernie Sanders won the caucuses here, but Clinton won the Primary. The battle for the soul of the party is playing out here as it is at the national level.

It is worse for the Republicans. For them it is largely a question of maintaining an identity of “Northwest Republicans” and trying to stay out of Trump’s shadow. “Pay no attention to that other Washington.”

What does this portend? For the Republicans, where is the winning coalition? In addition to the albatross of Trump, issues that inspire national Republicans are mostly losers here (environmental issues; reproductive rights; immigration).  Can state Republicans keep the rural blue collar voters? Can they do so and still win the suburban voters they need to get to a majority?

On the other side, will the Democrats try to make Washington an island of Trump resistance? Can they do so without further alienating rural counties? How can Democrats recapture rural blue collar voters? Or a more cynical question: how hard should they try? Democrats seem to be winning without them. If it’s just math, Democrats don’t need the coast if they win the Puget Sound suburbs.

These seem like questions that will animate Washington politics for the foreseeable future.

Attitude Items by Party Identification.

This table displays  the  12 core items used in this survey. Respondents were either read a pair of statements and asked which statement came closest to their opinion, or were read a single statement and asked whether they agreed or disagreed with that statement.

(From an April, 2017, Elway Poll. The full results of the survey are available at  www.elwayresearch.com)

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