Blexas: The Blue Tsunami

So America just had its mid-terms, and it went as well as it possibly could have. Not only did the Democrats take the house with a really comfortable majority (around 30 seats over the minimum, at time of writing), but also the senate with +3 seats over the minimum for a majority, +2 if you count Fetterman as a republican in spirit (which I do).

But the brunt of the analysis has been on Texas, which I don't really understand, if there was gonna be a Democrat that won in Texas, it was gonna be a white Christian seminarian with the most common name in America, James. But what's more worthy of analysis is the Republican reaction to Texas flipping blue in terms of the Senate and Governorship which usually goes something like this;

The only reason why Texas flipped is because of all the Californians/Democrats who moved to evade taxes.

- Every Republican i've spoken to since.

Texas is indeed a hotspot for migration in the United States; It has a low cost of living compared to other states, low to zero taxes, half decent infrastructure in major cities and hubs, etc. And yes, Californians have been moving to Texas to evade taxes as well as for work. But here's the thing they miss, who has been moving to Texas... Republicans. 57% of Migrants or "transplants" from "blue" states are registered Republicans only 27% of them were registered Democrats.

The numbers of migrants from "blue" states actually works against this argument, because between 600,000-750,000 migrants came from "blue" states (CA, NY, IL, WA, MA, OR, CO), and 57% of them were Republicans. So let's flesh this out with the results from Texas, what was the gap between Talerico and Paxton, by how many votes did Paxton lose to Talerico. 1,195,236 votes went to Talerico over Paxton, 1.1 Million is more than 750k, even more than 600k. But wait, there's more;

57% of 1,195,236 is 681,284 votes, those are the Republicans, so they went to Paxton. 27% (the liberals) that's 322,713 reliable votes to Talerico, that's still less than the 1.1 million that Talerico won by, so I'll throw the Republicans a bone, maybe some of the Republicans were anti-MAGA, that's a fair shout, so lets say 18% of those 681,284 republicans are Never Trumpers, they don't like Paxton because he's too aligned with Trump and also he has baggage, so they vote Talerico, so that's around 440,000 migrant votes to Talerico. Again still not 1.1 million, what about the independents? True that's 16% un-accounted for, so that's 120,000 migrants who are independents or non-partisan voters, lets be reasonable and say 50/50, 60k to Talerico, 60k to Paxton, so that is around 500,000 reliable migrant votes to Talerico, still less than 1.1 million.

So is it a reason why Texas flipped? Yes, is it the only reason Texas flipped? hell no, that's just cope-ium. The real reason why Texas flipped wasn't because of migrants, it was because of demographic shifts of another kind, the law of probability points towards home-grown Texas Republicans becoming disillusioned with MAGA and splitting with the party they had been with for much of their life. There's a lot to be disillusioned with, Trump ran as a peace president; picked a war with a country that he couldn't possibly back out of, on behalf of a country that at least 60% of Republicans hate, Israel. Trump ran on getting cost-of-living down, he hasn't because he has started wars and tariffed every country in existence. Trump said he'd only deport the criminals; he's deported criminals, non-criminals, and even tried to deport Native Americans.

So the Blue Tsunami that flipped Texas wasn't because of Californians, it was based on Trump, the cause is sitting in the White House sulking to himself right now, because he got exactly what he deserved. As for why other Southern states flipped or rather, maintained their Democratic senator in the case of Georgia is because Jon Ossoff is just a really good candidate, he's a solid senator, he's more progressive than most southern Democrats but isn't a capital P Progressive who'd spook Republicans.

Mississippi

Mississippi on the other hand, that hasn't been called yet but it looks like a really tight victory for Scott Colom, the Democrat. That race is a bit more mysterious, but my best guess is that similarly to Texas a big chunk of the vote towards Colom is lead by disillusioned Republicans, and also there was a massive push in the south by Chuck Schumer and other Democrats to get African-Americans registered to vote for the past year or so. So I think its a perfect storm of Trump being so ugly for Moderate Republicans that they'd be willing to break from the Republicans to maybe get Trump out or hold him accountable and the rise of the non-white Democratic vote.

Kansas

Adam Hamilton won the seat, the first Democrat to win the senate for Kansas in 94 years. Why did Adam win? Similar reason to my introduction to this, if anyone was going to win in Kansas, it would be a white Methodist minister called Adam. But also the same with Texas, Moderate Republicans flipped to back Adam in droves, partially because Adam used to be a Republican until around 2020. He didn't run on culture war issues, but that being said, he also didn't throw Trans people or migrants under the bus in the process. He was appealing to both Moderate Republicans and Progressives in Kansas.

Maine

Maine is a big one because Maine hasn't had a Democratic senator since 1995, so 31 years since their last one, and Susan Collins, the Republican who lost to Troy Jackson had served in that position for almost all of those 31 years without a Democrat Senator. So if there was going to be a Republican to beat, it was Susan Collins, and Troy did with a 4% margin which is beyond the margin of error in most elections.

Troy Jackson was a wildcard because he replaced Graham Platner after Platner had won the Primary, and Platner had to bow out of the race over sexual assault and battery accusations came out against him. Troy ran relatively unimpeded, because Troy's political acumen is identical to that of Platner, with none of the baggage. He's a old logger which represents a massive industry in Maine, he's also a Trade Union man with a long history supporting unions, he's also gone through a Political journey over the past 25-30 years, having been a Pro-lifer and Anti-LGBTQ many years ago, to now being fiercely pro-choice and Pro-LGBTQ. Troy won because he can speak to Republicans, moderates, independents on their level. He's also a Capital P Progressive, having been backed by Bernie Sanders and Hasan Piker.

South Carolina

South Carolina hasn't had a Democrat as a Senator since around 1998, so around 21 years. Annie Andrews kind of ran a best hits campaign, Pro-choice, Pro-path to citizenship, Medicare for All curious, Anti-corruption and Anti-war (to name a few) campaign. And she beat Darline Graham, the sister of closeted homosexual Lindsey Graham (don't take the bait). Darline had no political acumen unlike her brother, as far as I understand it, she mostly worked in the non-profit and third sector.

So it was an easy-ish storm for Annie, she could take pop-shots at the fact that Darline didn't work for her nomination, she was appointed like a monarch, and had no tangible experience in politics, because she had no political experience, she had no real policies that were backed by any kind coherent ideas, and could easily attack her on that basis, and also her brothers long-history of voting against policies that would have made his life easier... like Gay rights given that many a gay escort have come out with receipts that Lindsey paid them for sex.

South Carolina flipped because Darline was not a good replacement for Lindsey, Lindsey's track record of supporting the Iran War got transplanted onto his sister, and Annie Andrews was a great communicator of what she believed. Annie is also a doctor, a paediatrician to be exact, and thus had practical on-the-ground experience of the topics she was talking about. Darline had nothing going for her, other than who her brother was.

In conclusion

The win for the Democrats will definitely allow them to do what the Congress is supposed to do, hold the executive to account. Which frankly is what the Republicans were supposed to be doing, but instead were just enabling the executive to ignore the constitution until it was convenient for them. But more importantly, it actually did something for the Republicans.

It showed the Republicans that no seat was guaranteed, and that no race they won was actually safe. Because what I didn't mention was Florida, Florida could have flipped blue this election, the race was tighter than it had been before, and that is not what the Republicans ever expected. Same with many other races in "red" states. States that have been red for the past 30+ years have been so through smart electioneering and choice, not because of good governance.