VoteHub just came out with what is probably the best political data visualization dashboard I’ve seen. It allows you to dive into the precinct level results, and shades it by margins and not just who won, so we can literally see the geographic gradients as we shift from more Democrat areas to more Republican areas. It also allows you to see the volume of vote count in 3D.
So while Mormonism is famously red, where are our “Austins,” islands of blue in a sea of red?
First of all, the Tree Streets right next to BYU and central Provo. That makes sense to me; the Tree Streets are essentially a college town, and when I drive in downtown Provo there are a lot of rainbow flags and I definitely get a cool hipster Austin independent rocker kind of vibe with events like the rooftop concerts.
Other Mormon Austins include downtown Ogden, downtown Logan, and, unsurprisingly, Salt Lake City (although I don’t know how “Mormon” some of those places are anymore). However, less expected is downtown Pocatello, Idaho, which voted blue in the last election. Finally, North Las Vegas is both blue and kind of a mini-Utah (at least we kind of rule it even if we’re not numerically predominant. When I was serving there as a visa-waiting missionary almost all the councilmen were members, and the slumlords would let us know where the new move-ins were, which I thought was odd until I realized they were members).
What about “swing precincts.” If those places are the Austins, where are the Ohios? The politically diverse places in Mormondom where you would live if you want about half of your neighbors to be democrats and half republicans? The main candidate is the transition zone between Utah and Salt Lake counties (everywhere else the blue-to-red transition happens quite abruptly).
Specifically, it looks like there’s a “blue wall” that runs diagonal from the Point of the Mountain up to the airport, so Sandy, West Jordan, and Taylorsville probably win for most politically diverse areas of Mormondom.
P.S. A fun aside that is totally unrelated to the OP, but it’s not worth its own post so I thought I’d append it here. I recently got access to the new AI video generator Sora 2. I don’t think it’s as good as Gemini’s, but I asked it to make “the most Mormon scene ever” and this is what it generated (apologies that I can’t figure out how to shrink the movie).
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8 responses to “Mormon Austins: Blue Islands and Swing Precincts Across the Mormon Corridor”
Interesting (to me) outliers:
The SL valley South of Taylorsville and West of I-15 is very red, except for Daybreak, which is light blue. One non-Daybreak precinct that Trump won by 40 points is bordered on 3 sides by Daybreak precincts that Harris won by 2 to 15 points.
BYU-I is very, very red. I don’t know my way around Rexburg well enough to know who lives where, but every precinct up there went for Trump by 40-65 points. This is an interesting contrast to Provo where the areas around BYU range from Trump +30 to Harris +10. Are BYU students really 40 points more liberal than BYU-I students?
DaveW, I don’t know for sure, but my understanding is that Rexburg makes it near impossible for college students to register to vote — they don’t want students participating in their elections, so BYU-I students generally have to vote in their “home” precincts (usually where their parents live) if they want to vote at all.
I can’t open the link on my phone, but downtown Pocatello, depending on how you define it, takes in Idaho State University. ISU isn’t exactly a known as liberal stronghold, but it’s not surprising to me that a college town went against Trump in the last election.
Confirming ji’s comment about Rexburg–they hate students voting in Rexburg and do everything they can to discourage it.
I really appreciate you linking to this website, as I’m looking to move to a more politically diverse neighborhood in Eastern Idaho and this website details that my current neighborhood is 80/15 (not at all politically diverse) and neighborhoods I’m looking to move to are 55/40 or 60/35 (much more politically diverse).
-Pocatello is knows as the liberal stronghold of east idaho because it has the lowest Mormon population percentage because it was founded as Fort Hall on the Oregon trail and morphed into a UP railroad town. I grew up there, it’s the equivalent of working class Ogden that everyone likes to dunk on but is actually cool.
-I’m now in rexburg and, as I suspected, the two precincts on the hill up east of campus are the most politically diverse with only 70% Trump vote, 5% other and a full 25% clocking blue. This area has a higher percentage of faculty members w phds, etc. who tend to be more nuanced with degrees and friends from outside Mormon valley. As you get farther out country (Plano, Burton) you’re getting to 89% Trump vote.
And yes students are discouraged STRONGLY from voting here, very few do… but locals still complain that’s what ruins Rexburg (it doesn’t). It does make sense, idaho is a foregone conclusion in presidential voting, and their home swing states are more strategic places. If they vote here, they also have to register car and pay taxes here, etc. the school also stays away from any kind of civic politicking and voter registration. Those aren’t allowed on campus. They were banned back when byui college dems did voter registration during an Obama election and a faculty member harassed the students, if I remember right (?) yelling and knocking over their paperwork and tables etc. instead of correcting the employee they banned anything that could cause “contention.”
Thanks for sharing.
DaveW, BYU students aren’t liberal. The tree streets are zoned for single family homes. It’s a faculty neighborhood, not students. The students are south and west of campus, which are very red in that map. (Few students are southwest of campus, incidentally, the other blue area.)
I’ve never even been to Rexburg but from the comments about it the moniker “Saudi Arabia of Mormonism” that I’ve frequently heard about Rexburg seems legit.
I can’t comment on Saudi Arabia, but Rexburg is a very pleasant place to live.