2020_United_States_presidential_election_in_Virginia

2020 United States presidential election in Virginia

2020 United States presidential election in Virginia

Election in Virginia

Main article: 2020 United States presidential election

The 2020 United States presidential election in Virginia was held on Tuesday, November 3, 2020, as part of the 2020 United States presidential election in which all 50 states plus the District of Columbia participated.[2] Virginia voters chose electors to represent them in the Electoral College via a popular vote, pitting the Republican Party's nominee, incumbent President Donald Trump, and running mate Vice President Mike Pence against Democratic Party nominee, former Vice President Joe Biden, and his running mate California Senator Kamala Harris. Virginia has 13 electoral votes in the Electoral College.[3]

Quick Facts Turnout, Nominee ...

Prior to the election, most news organizations considered this a state Biden would win, or a likely blue state. On the day of the election, Biden won Virginia with 54.15% of the vote, and by a margin of 10.2%, the best performance for a Democratic presidential candidate since Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1944.[4] Trump became the first Republican incumbent to consecutively lose Virginia since William Howard Taft and Biden became the first Democratic nominee to win Chesterfield County and Lynchburg City since 1948, Virginia Beach City since 1964, James City County since 1968, and Stafford County since 1976.[5] He also flipped Chesapeake City back to the Democratic Party. Trump flipped no counties or independent cities in the state. Nevertheless, Biden became the first Democrat since 1960 to win without Westmoreland County, a notable bellwether. He was the first Democrat to ever win without Caroline County, Nelson County, or Covington.[citation needed]

The diversification of Northern Virginia as well as sliding suburban support for Republicans allowed Biden to win the once-key battleground state without actively campaigning in it. Biden won Henrico County, Loudoun County, Prince William County, and Fairfax County with 63.7%, 61.5%, 63.6%, and 69.9%, respectively; all four were former suburban bastions of the Republican Party in Virginia, the first outside Richmond and the others in Northern Virginia. All four had voted Republican in every election from 1968 through 2000. In Arlington County, a closer DC-area suburban county that had turned Democratic several decades earlier, Biden won with 80.6% of the vote, becoming the first nominee of either party in more than a century to do so. Biden's combined margin in Fairfax, Prince William, Loudoun, and Arlington Counties was greater than his statewide margin of victory. Crucially for his performance in Northern Virginia, Biden carried government workers by 18%.[6]

Primary elections

Canceled Republican primary

Further information: 2020 Republican Party presidential primaries § Cancellation of state caucuses or primaries

The Virginia Republican Party is one of several state GOP parties that have officially canceled their respective primaries and caucuses.[7] Donald Trump's re-election campaign and GOP officials have cited the fact that Republicans canceled several state primaries when George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush sought a second term in 1992 and 2004, respectively; and Democrats scrapped some of their primaries when Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were seeking reelection in 1996 and 2012, respectively.[8][9] At the Virginia State Republican Convention, originally scheduled for May 2020 but postponed to August 15, 2020, the state party will formally bind all 48 of its national pledged delegates to Trump.[7][10][11]

Democratic primary

Further information: 2020 Virginia Democratic primary
Sanders at a rally in Richmond on February 27, 2020

The Virginia Democratic primary took place on March 3, 2020, as part of the "Super Tuesday" suite of elections.

Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders were among the major declared candidates.[12]

More information Candidate, Votes ...
This section is an excerpt from 2020 Virginia Democratic presidential primary § VAresults.[edit]
county
Popular vote share by county
  Biden—30–40%
  Biden—40–50%
  Biden—50–60%
  Biden—60–70%
  Biden—70–80%
  Sanders—30–40%
  Sanders—40–50%
congressional district
Popular vote share by congressional district
  Biden—40–50%
  Biden—50–60%

Green primary

The Green Party of Virginia conducted an online ranked choice primary from April 20 to April 26, 2020.[16]

More information Candidate, Round 1 ...

General election

Predictions

More information Source, Ranking ...

Polling

Graphical summary

Aggregate polls

More information Source of poll aggregation, Dates administered ...

Polls

More information Poll source, Date(s) administered ...
More information Former candidates, Poll source ...
More information Hypothetical polling, Poll source ...

Results

Line for early voting in Herndon
More information Party, Candidate ...

Results by city and county

More information County/City, Joe Biden Democratic ...

Results by congressional district

Biden won 7 out of Virginia's 11 congressional districts.

More information District, Trump ...

Counties and independent cities that flipped from Republican to Democratic

Analysis

In this election, Virginia voted 5.6% more Democratic than the nation as a whole. Although Virginia was considered a reliably Republican state at the presidential level from 1952 to 2004 (having only gone to the Democrats once during that period, in Lyndon B. Johnson's 1964 landslide), it has not voted Republican in a presidential election since 2004. In recent years, densely populated counties in Northern Virginia close to Washington, D.C., have tilted towards the Democrats. This was the first election since 1988 that a presidential candidate won Virginia by double digits (George H. W. Bush having carried the state by 20.5% in his first run), and the first election in which any presidential candidate received over 2 million votes in Virginia.

As fellow Southern state Georgia tilted towards Biden, he became the first Democrat since Harry Truman in 1948 to carry both states. This was also the first election in which a former Confederate state backed a Democratic candidate by a margin of victory greater than 10% since 1996, when Arkansas and Louisiana did so for Bill Clinton.

Following the election, news and political analysts considered the presidential results in Virginia, along with Democrats holding the senate seat held by Mark Warner, their house congressional majority, plus the previous year's elections in which Democrats flipped the state General Assembly, to be indicative that it was no longer a swing state, but a blue state.[32][33]

Their domination of state and local offices would be short-lived, however, as in 2021 the Republicans flipped the Democratic-held offices of governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general, as well as winning control of the Virginia House of Delegates.[34][35] In 2023, Democrats recaptured the House of Delegates, winning full control of the General Assembly once again, albeit by narrower margins than what they acquired in 2019.

Voter demographics

More information Demographic subgroup, Biden ...

See also

Notes

  1. The "2020 March Democratic Presidential Primary" website published by the Virginia Department of Elections does not include the write-in votes.[14] This article includes them.
  2. Candidate withdrew during absentee voting, shortly before the primary.
  3. Candidate withdrew following the New Hampshire primary, when absentee voting had already begun.
  4. Calculated by taking the difference of 100% and all other candidates combined.
  5. Key:
    A – all adults
    RV – registered voters
    LV – likely voters
    V – unclear
  6. Overlapping sample with the previous SurveyMonkey/Axios poll, but more information available regarding sample size
  7. "Other candidate or write-in" with 1%
  8. "Someone else" with 2%
  9. "Third party candidate" with 2%
  10. Includes "refused"
  11. "Other", "None of these" and would not vote with 0%
  12. "Someone else" with 3%
  13. With voters who lean towards a given candidate
  14. "Another candidate" with 2%
  15. "Third party candidate" with 1%
  16. "Some other candidate" with 3%
  17. Additional data sourced from FiveThirtyEight
  18. "Would vote for a third party candidate" with 6%
  19. "It is time to have someone else in office" as opposed to "Trump should be re-elected" with 59%
  20. "Refused" with 0%
Partisan clients
  1. Poll conducted by Daniel Gade's campaign

References

  1. [1]
    "Virginia Department of Elections - Registration/Turnout Reports".
  2. [2]
    Kelly, Ben (August 13, 2018). "US elections key dates: When are the 2018 midterms and the 2020 presidential campaign?". The Independent. Archived from the original on August 2, 2018. Retrieved January 3, 2019.
  3. [3]
    "Distribution of Electoral Votes". National Archives and Records Administration. Retrieved January 3, 2019.
  4. [4]
    "Without Northern Virginia, Trump would have won the state". Inside Nova. Retrieved November 17, 2020.
  5. [5]
    "Chesterfield and Lynchburg hadn't backed a Democrat for president since 1948. Biden changed that". Virginia Mercury. November 5, 2020. Retrieved November 17, 2020.
  6. [6]
    "Virginia Voter Surveys: How Different Groups Voted". The New York Times. November 3, 2020. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved November 13, 2020.
  7. [7]
    "Virginia Republicans Will Hold 2020 Presidential Preference Vote at State Convention". Frontloading. September 18, 2019. Retrieved September 19, 2019.
  8. [8]
    Karni, Annie (September 6, 2019). "GOP plans to drop presidential primaries in 4 states to impede Trump challengers". The Boston Globe. MSN. Retrieved September 7, 2019.
  9. [9]
    Steakin, Will; Karson, Kendall (September 6, 2019). "GOP considers canceling at least 3 GOP primaries and caucuses, Trump challengers outraged". ABC News. Retrieved September 7, 2019.
  10. [10]
    "Virginia Republican Delegation 2020". The Green Papers. Retrieved February 20, 2020.
  11. [11]
    Mattingly, Justin (June 30, 2020). "Republican Party of Virginia reschedules 'unassembled' convention for August". Richmond Times-Dispatch. Retrieved July 10, 2020.
  12. [12]
    Taylor, Kate (February 9, 2019). "Elizabeth Warren Formally Announces 2020 Presidential Bid in Lawrence, Mass". The New York Times. Retrieved February 10, 2019.
  13. [13]
    "2020 March Democratic Presidential Primary". Virginia.gov. Virginia Department of Elections. Archived from the original on March 27, 2020. Retrieved March 25, 2020.
  14. [14]
    "2020 March Democratic Presidential Primary". Virginia Department of Elections. Retrieved March 11, 2020.
  15. [15]
    "2020 Presidential Primaries, Caucuses, and Conventions: Virginia Democrat". The Green Papers. Retrieved July 4, 2020.
  16. [16]
    Jonah Thomas (May 12, 2020). "2020 GPVA Presidential Primary Results".
  17. [17]
    "2020 POTUS Race ratings" (PDF). The Cook Political Report. Retrieved May 21, 2019.
  18. [18]
    "POTUS Ratings | Inside Elections". insideelections.com. Retrieved May 21, 2019.
  19. [19]
    "Larry J. Sabato's Crystal Ball » 2020 President". crystalball.centerforpolitics.org. Retrieved May 21, 2019.
  20. [20]
    "2020 Election Forecast". Politico. November 19, 2019.
  21. [21]
    "Battle for White House". RCP. April 19, 2019.
  22. [22]
    2020 Bitecofer Model Electoral College Predictions Archived April 23, 2020, at the Wayback Machine, Niskanen Center, March 24, 2020, retrieved: April 19, 2020
  23. [23]
    David Chalian; Terence Burlij (June 11, 2020). "Road to 270: CNN's debut Electoral College map for 2020". CNN. Retrieved June 16, 2020.
  24. [24]
    "Forecasting the US elections". The Economist. Retrieved July 7, 2020.
  25. [25]
    "2020 Election Battleground Tracker". CBS News. July 12, 2020. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  26. [26]
    "2020 Presidential Election Interactive Map". 270 to Win.
  27. [27]
    "ABC News Race Ratings". ABC News. July 24, 2020. Retrieved July 24, 2020.
  28. [28]
    Montanaro, Domenico (September 16, 2020). "2020 Electoral Map Ratings: Landscape tightens some, but Biden is still ahead". NPR. Retrieved January 15, 2021.
  29. [29]
    "Biden continues to lead in our latest battleground map". NBC News. October 27, 2020. Retrieved January 15, 2021.
  30. [30]
    "Biden is very likely to win Virginia". FiveThirtyEight. August 12, 2020. Retrieved January 15, 2021.
  31. [31]
    "2020 November General". results.elections.virginia.gov. Archived from the original on January 2, 2021. Retrieved November 20, 2020.
  32. [32]
    "Virginia went from purple to blue. Here's what lies ahead for Virginia Republicans". 13newsnow.com. November 5, 2020. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
  33. [33]
    "EDITORIAL: 'NoVA creep" turns former red state blue". Fredericksburg.com. November 18, 2020. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
  34. [34]
    "So, what color is Virginia now?". Roll Call. November 16, 2021. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
  35. [35]
    "Republicans Bucked Virginia's Blue State Trend. Here Are A Few Reasons Why". WAMU. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
  36. [36]
    "Virginia 2020 President Exit Polls". www.cnn.com. Retrieved December 14, 2020.
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