This NM Place Has Picked Every President Since 1952. Is Its Streak About to End?

You know what they say: “As Valencia County goes, so goes the nation.” What? You’ve never heard that? You’ve never even heard of Valencia County? Well, I suppose that’s not altogether surprising. Tucked into the sublime, mountain-ringed deserts south of Albuquerque, Valencia County has a population of 76,688 people. It’s the sixth-most populous county in New Mexico, a state not exactly known for its populous counties. It’s probably not a place you’ve visited. It’s surely not a place you’d assign any political significance. Except that Valencia County has the longest streak of picking presidents of any county in the United States. It started in 1952, when Dwight D. Eisenhower ended the Democratic Party’s two-decade-long occupation of the White House. In every election since, the candidate who has carried Valencia County has also won the presidency. As if that weren’t impressive enough, the candidates’ vote share here has often mirrored (or come very close to mirroring) their performances nationally, making this county the unlikeliest microcosm of American elections. That’s right. Forget Ohio. Forget Pennsylvania. Forget Florida, Florida, Florida. The true bellwether of presidential politics is a rectangle-shaped 1,068 square miles of cattle ranches, Native American reservations and commuter suburbs, an obscure county in a small Southwestern state that hasn’t been nationally competitive since 2004. Political scientists will tell you that using one place to gauge the broader behaviors of America is dangerous; that voters have self-selected—culturally, economically, geographically—in ways that breed mass polarization, turning red areas redder and blue areas bluer, all while making national campaigns less about persuasion than about pure base mobilization. But that’s precisely why Valencia County’s 68-year streak is so remarkable: In an era when partisan loyalties have hardened, a tiny subgroup of New Mexicans has defied definition in a way that no other community of voters can claim. So, what gives? What makes Valencia County the most accurate voting jurisdiction in America?...MORE