How blue states could lose decisive number of electoral votes to red states in next Census

14 November 2024

Democrats' path to 270 Electoral College votes may get even more difficult after the 2030 Census if blue states continue bleeding out residents to red states.

A recent report by the Atlantic's Jerusalem Demsas explored how the electoral vote math is already shifting due to migration trends between states. Populous, deep-blue states like California, Illinois and New York have been steadily losing residents who are moving to Republican-dominated states like Florida and Texas.

According to the conservative-leaning American Redistricting Project (ARP), if current trends continue, Democrats would lose an additional eight electoral votes if the Democratic candidate in 2032 won the same states that Vice President Kamala Harris won in the 2024 election. This means that even if that candidate were to win the coveted "Blue Wall" states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, it still wouldn't be enough to cross the 270-vote threshold.

This exodus would also result in Republican states getting more seats in the House of Representatives. The Brennan Center for Justice estimates that if current patterns hold, Democrats could lose up to four seats. ARP's calculations have Democrats losing five seats. Because the Senate already favors more rural, less populated states with disproportionate representation (43 states have smaller populations than Los Angeles County alone), this means Republicans would have a relatively easy path to a trifecta government every four years.

Blue state residents aren't moving to red states necessarily because of their politics, but because of their lower costs of living. A February 2024 survey by the Public Policy Institute of California found that of the approximately 600,000 Golden State residents who left over the last 10 years said the high cost of housing was the chief reason. Demsas also observed that blue states and large Democratic-controlled urban centers have had a "hostility" toward population growth going back several decades.

"In the early 1970s, the UCLA professor Fred Abraham pushed for growth limits, arguing, 'We need fewer people here—a quality of life, not a quantity of life. We must request a moratorium on growth and recognize that growth should be stopped,'" she wrote. "Such arguments preceded a now infamous downzoning in the ’70s and ’80s, which substantially reduced the number of homes that could be legally built, slashed the potential population capacity of Los Angeles from an estimated 10 million people to 4 million and spurred one of the nation’s most acute housing and homelessness crises."

"Self-styled progressives and liberals in blue communities across the country have taken similar approaches, all but directing would-be newcomers to places like Texas and Florida," she added.

Aside from blue state lawmakers prioritizing affordable housing policy, there are few solutions available to prevent the exodus of voters to redder states. However, there have been several proposals aimed at reforming the Electoral College to shift it away from a winner-take-all system to one in which electoral votes are awarded proportionally. Washington Post columnist Theodore Johnson said proportional allocation is necessary to both protect democracy and remain true to the framers' intent.

"Importantly, this reform would continue the electoral college’s built-in protections. It wouldn’t be a simple reflection of the popular vote," he wrote. "Instead, the college would refocus its protection from favoring low-population states to giving voice to political minorities everywhere — an outcome truer to the college’s founding idea."

Additionally, the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) — in which states pledge to award their Electoral College votes to the winner of the national popular vote — already has 18 signatories accounting for 224 Electoral College votes. If a small number of state legislatures like Arizona, Michigan, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Virginia agree to join the NPVIC, it would render the Electoral College obsolete, as presidents would by default be elected via popular vote.

Click here to read the Demsas' full report in the Atlantic (subscription required).

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