* Obama had a smaller margin of victory in Montgomery County this year than in any of the other large counties – Cuyahoga, Franklin, Hamilton, Summit and Lucas.
* While Franklin (Columbus) and Hamilton (Cincinnati) counties have made dramatic shifts toward the Democratic Party in the past four presidential elections, Montgomery County has landed in the same small window each time — favoring the Democratic candidate by 1 to 6 percentage points.
* When you examine whether each county voted more Republican or more Democratic than the state as a whole, Montgomery County is still Democratic, but it’s the only one of the six large counties where the 12-year trend has moved more toward the Republicans than the Democrats.
In the 2000 Bush-Gore race, Montgomery County voted 5.6 percentage points more Democratic than the state as a whole. In 2004’s Bush-Kerry race, the county was 3.7 points more Democratic than Ohio. In Obama-McCain 2008, Montgomery County was 1.6 points more Democratic. And this year, the county appears to be about 2.2 points more Democratic than the state as a whole, pending a statewide compilation from the Secretary of State’s office.
“Central cities are becoming more Democratic (and) suburbs are more Republican,” said John Green, director of the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron. “One thing that helps explain the county numbers is the relative balance of cities and suburbs. In Montgomery, the suburbs are a larger portion of the vote, but in Franklin and Cuyahoga (Cleveland) they are a smaller portion.”
Minority impact
While many variables impact vote swings in Ohio’s large counties, the counties where Democratic presidential margins are growing exactly match the counties where minority population has grown.
Franklin County, which had the largest swing toward Democrats from the 2000 to 2012 presidential elections (+21.8 points), also had the largest percentage growth in minority population (+7.1 points) between the 2000 to 2010 censuses.
On the other end is Montgomery County, which has seen the least minority population growth of the big six counties (+3.2 points). And paralleling that statistic, Democrats have made the least headway here in presidential elections, seeing their margin grow just 2.5 points – from Al Gore beating George W. Bush by 2.1 points in Montgomery County in 2000 to Obama beating Mitt Romney by 4.6 points this year.
Minority voters have traditionally backed Democratic candidates, and that continued in 2012. According to the National Election Pool Exit Poll conducted by Edison Research, African-American voters in Ohio favored Obama over Romney by a 96-3 margin, while Hispanic voters backed Obama 54-42.
"We need to really reach out to the minority population," said Montgomery County Republican Party Chairman Rob Scott. "If you look at the election results, we continue to get worse and worse with African-Americans as well as Hispanics. We're going to have to deal with the illegal immigration issue. If Republicans really want to make inroads into the Hispanic population, we need to tackle that issue and have more of a compassionate message."
This year in Montgomery County, it was the communities with the largest minority populations that delivered the county to Obama, while the six communities with the highest support for Romney were all small rural communities on the west side of the county.
Together, Dayton, Trotwood, and Harrison and Jefferson townships. went more than 3-1 for Obama, giving him a margin over Mitt Romney of almost 47,000 votes. Those four communities (which have a combined 52 percent minority population) overmatched the other 23 communities that went for Romney, but by smaller margins.
“The African-American vote percentage for Obama isn’t much different than it was for Kerry or Gore, but it was the turnout (of black voters) that matched the turnout of whites for the first time,” said Dan Birdsong, a political scientist at the University of Dayton.
With Obama unable to run for re-election in 2016 after two full terms, the question will be whether minority voters will stay engaged and still come out to vote in large numbers.
“Republicans have some opening in 2016, where if they run the right people and run on the right platform, they could make some inroads in these areas,” Birdsong said.
Win big in big places
One way Montgomery County did mirror Ohio is the way in which Obama won — dominating the urban areas that have more population.
Romney actually won 23 of 28 jurisdictions in Montgomery County, but Obama won the countywide vote. He dominated Dayton, which more than doubles the size of any other community, and won Trotwood and Harrison Twp., which are among the county’s 10 biggest locations.
Similarly, Romney won 72 of 88 counties in Ohio, but Obama won the statewide vote. Obama dominated Cuyahoga and Franklin counties, which more than double the size of 85 other counties, and he won eight of the state’s 10 most populous counties.
“How many of these smaller geographic units do you need to offset a 30,000-vote margin in Dayton? The answer is quite a few,” said Matthew V. Filipic, political science professor at Wright State University. “Statewide it’s the same question. How many relatively small counties with a Republican margin do you need to offset Cuyahoga County?”
The trend was almost identical in 2008, when Obama won the exact same five jurisdictions in Montgomery County and only 22 of 88 counties statewide, but still carried the state and the county.
“I think it’s true in Ohio and more broadly in the country that the Democratic vote tends to be more concentrated — concentrated in urban areas and urban states,” Filipic said. “And if you look at any of the electoral college maps at so many websites, you see an awful lot more red (area than blue).”
Montgomery County stability
While most of Ohio’s big urban counties voted for Obama by double-digit margins, Montgomery County’s race has always been within 9 points in the past 20 years, and usually within 5 points.
“It’s been kinda stable,” county Democratic Party Chairman Mark Owens said this month. “Countywide races, when they are contested, very rarely does either side get more than 55 percent. We’re a close county and we have been for the last quarter-century.”
Census estimates from 2010 and 2011 showed the population actually grew some in Montgomery County, meaning the flight to the outer suburbs, which Birdsong said has dramatically changed Hamilton County, may have less impact here.
Most local communities voted roughly the same in 2008 as they did in 2012 — none flipped from Obama to the Republican party or vice versa. Oakwood, Washington Twp. and Centerville saw their Republican vote percentage jump by 4 to 7 points, while Dayton, Trotwood and Harrison Twp. all moved 2 to 4 percent more Democratic.
Huber Heights, West Carrollton and Riverside moved slightly to the left, while Kettering, Miamisburg and Englewood shifted a bit to the right. It’s those city-by-city numbers that politicians will examine when the next election rolls around.
“Our job is to gain enough in the suburbs; look at Washington Twp., Centerville, Brookville — areas that are very, very strong Republican — we did not slam dunk it,” Scott said of the Nov. 6 results. “But at the same time, we have to get a little bit out of Trotwood and West Dayton. … It’s the tactics of what issue you pick to try to win over those voters.”
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