Why hasn't a Democrat won in Texas since 1994?

[CastletonSnob]

I'm genuinely curious as to why a Democrat hasn't won ANY statewide position since 1994. EVERY other state has had at least ONE Democrat win a position since then, even the reddest states.

[stepee]

cuz i don’t wanna 

[SaysWho?]

It just didn't. It went super Republican. Other states had some Democratic governors too, but it wasn't frequent. Alabama and Mississippi had one each and then it was straight Republican.

 

Sometimes a state has a long streak. You could say, "Why hasn't Minnesota voted Republican since 1972? Every other state has voted Republican at least once since then, even Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut, Michigan, Hawaii, and California!" but it just is how it happened.

[CastletonSnob]

2 minutes ago, SaysWho? said:

It just didn't. It went super Republican. Other states had some Democratic governors too, but it wasn't frequent. Alabama and Mississippi had one each and then it was straight Republican.

 

Sometimes a state has a long streak. You could say, "Why hasn't Minnesota voted Republican since 1972? Every other state has voted Republican at least once since then, even Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut, Michigan, Hawaii, and California!" but it just is how it happened.

Sometimes, a state just has one party in power for a long time?

[BloodyHell]

11 hours ago, CastletonSnob said:

I'm genuinely curious as to why a Democrat hasn't won ANY statewide position since 1994. EVERY other state has had at least ONE Democrat win a position since then, even the reddest states.

Because it's a very red state.

[BloodyHell]

11 hours ago, CastletonSnob said:

Sometimes, a state just has one party in power for a long time?

As long as the voting population allows. Its not a playroom, there's no taking turns. 

 

I want to ask you something, and im not trying to sound mean or anything, but are you extremely new to politics? Like, have you just never paid attention to it before? 

[PaladinSolo]

21 minutes ago, BloodyHell said:

Because it's a very red state.

It was a very red state, in the next few cycles it will not be surprising if a dem wins statewide, and will become a swing state, at the district level the GOP has made sure they'll never lose power there, at least not for a long time.

[CastletonSnob]

24 minutes ago, BloodyHell said:

As long as the voting population allows. Its not a playroom, there's no taking turns. 

 

I want to ask you something, and im not trying to sound mean or anything, but are you extremely new to politics? Like, have you just never paid attention to it before? 

I only started following politics around 2017, and even then, I got a lot of my information from r/politics comments sections.

[CastletonSnob]

35 minutes ago, BloodyHell said:

Because it's a very red state.

Not really. Almost all of the major cities are blue, as is the RGV area, and parts of West Texas (El Paso). The suburbs around Austin and Houston are turning blue as well. Trump won Texas by fewer than a million votes both times.

 

Texas is actually closer to purple than it is red, especially compared to most of the south.

[TheLeon]

If they haven’t elected any Dems for nearly three decades, that sounds pretty damn red to me. 

[BloodyHell]

3 hours ago, CastletonSnob said:

Not really. Almost all of the major cities are blue, as is the RGV area, and parts of West Texas (El Paso). The suburbs around Austin and Houston are turning blue as well. Trump won Texas by fewer than a million votes both times.

 

Texas is actually closer to purple than it is red, especially compared to most of the south.

Until they vote otherwise though, they are still a very red state. You can't count voters who won't vote as part of your cause, unless you can convince them otherwise. 

[Guest]

I think red/blue distinctions are not nuanced enough. Texas is red, but in many ways not as conservative as states like Oklahoma/Mississippi/Alabama. Similarly, when the state eventually has a blue swing, it won’t be as liberal as California or Massachusetts.

[GeneticBlueprint]

17 hours ago, CastletonSnob said:

I'm genuinely curious as to why a Democrat hasn't won ANY statewide position since 1994. EVERY other state has had at least ONE Democrat win a position since then, even the reddest states.

Close. But not Utah.

 

Edit: Actually nevermind, you are correct. I wasn't considering AG positions with that statement. But even then Utah doesn't fare much better. It would be since 1996.

[CastletonSnob]

I read somewhere that Texas has 3 million unregistered voters, the majority of them Black or Hispanic.

3 million is MORE than enough to win an election.

[Fizzzzle]

Utah also votes red, but Mormons as a group kind of generally don't fit into a red/blue category for certain things.

[Massdriver]

Texas is red because voters want republicans to lead the state. New voters moving to the state aren’t necessarily solid blue. Many Hispanics in Texas rely on the oil sector for employment, ‘back the blue’, and are socially conservative thus vote for the GOP.

 

Democrats are terribly organized and the national party doesn’t spend much here. 
 

Still, things are changing incrementally. Eventually a Democrat like Beto in 2018 will catch fire like he did  during the right election cycle and win a state ride race. 

[GeneticBlueprint]

13 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

Utah also votes red, but Mormons as a group kind of generally don't fit into a red/blue category for certain things.

 

I think you could say that about any voting bloc tbh. I feel mormons are pretty standard Republicans for the most part.

[Fizzzzle]

2 hours ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

 

I think you could say that about any voting bloc tbh. I feel mormons are pretty standard Republicans for the most part.

Yeah, I just mean that they can be surprisingly liberal in ways you might not expect. This is anecdotal, but one of my old roommates is gay, and she dreaded the day she came out to her uber-mormon family. They were totally fine with it and accepting of her.

 

However, when she told them she was leaving the church, that's when they basically disowned her.

 

I grew up in a pretty heavily Mormon area, and my experience is that they're not like "maga chud" Republicans for the most part. 

[Fizzzzle]

Basically the Mormon view of Christio-Nationalism does not always line up with the MAGA crowd

[CastletonSnob]

The Democrats should be throwing their money at Garza, who has the best chance of winning out of any Democrat in Texas, not twice-failed Beto.

 

I simply don't understand Democrats' strategy.

[SaysWho?]

1 hour ago, CastletonSnob said:

The Democrats should be throwing their money at Garza, who has the best chance of winning out of any Democrat in Texas, not twice-failed Beto.

 

I simply don't understand Democrats' strategy.

 

Putting aside going nowhere in 2020 (as he shouldn't have since he wasn't ready for president, and that's totally different than a partisan race like governor), he's one of the best performing Democrats in Texas statewide since Ann Richards in 1990.

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

Through time I’ve seen multiple reasons. 
 

gerrymandering. Republicans have divided up the state so that even if the voting state wide lines up 49/51 in favor of Democrats the Republicans would win 80% of state wide and federal seats. 
 

Migrants. Not from other countries but other states. Yes Texas is getting new residents from states like California and New York, but many are more conservative leaning. Following or moving a business to Tx to take advantage of the bare minimum labor laws, and business friendly policies and tax incentives.
 

Abortion and Hispanic Americans. Even if they hate the attitudes towards Hispanic immigrants they also want to put a stop to abortion more. And Republicans will inundate them with campaign ads regarding it. Spending far more than Democrats. 
 

winner take all and ROI. Like many states, in the general election Texas is winner takes all. So there’s nothing to be gained by losing by even 1%. And when the margin is as much as 10% or more the Democratic Party is reluctant to spend any money in Texas. So nationally Democrats have basically just let Republicans keep Texas with almost no opposition. 

[GeneticBlueprint]

On 10/21/2022 at 5:06 PM, Fizzzzle said:

Yeah, I just mean that they can be surprisingly liberal in ways you might not expect. This is anecdotal, but one of my old roommates is gay, and she dreaded the day she came out to her uber-mormon family. They were totally fine with it and accepting of her.

 

However, when she told them she was leaving the church, that's when they basically disowned her.

 

I grew up in a pretty heavily Mormon area, and my experience is that they're not like "maga chud" Republicans for the most part. 

 

Hmm. Well, I won’t discount your experience but I used to be Mormon and I can relate mine. I just moved out of the mormonest town of the mormonest county of the mormonest state about half a year ago. I still live in Utah but in a much less Mormon area. But that would still make it more Mormon populated than most areas of the country. I can only speak to generalities that I perceive and acknowledge that exceptions can be found just about anywhere. 
 

Anyways, when the 2016 election happened I’ll grant that Utah did not like Trump even though the state went to him. McMullin took a huge chunk of his support away. But I can say with surety: that after the election all the conservatives here got on the Trump train. It was back to typical levels in the 2020 election.
 

I think your friend’s experience is atypical unfortunately. A nuclear family is essential in Mormon doctrine more than any other religion I’d wager. Its highest rituals and ordinances center around it. Procreation between a man and a woman happens not just in this life but the next according to the doctrine. Thus, revilement towards non-heteronormativity in all its forms goes a bit beyond the standard Old Testament view that most Christians have of it. Though they are very good at avoiding direct hate speech about the LGBT community. So that’s a plus.
 

And it’s definitely good for your friend that her family didn’t mistreat her because of that specifically. I’d imagine they took the view that she’d just be celibate in this life and god would magically “fix” her in the next life or possibly this one. But I don’t know them so I can’t say that for sure. It’s just one of many ways individual Mormons have of mentally dealing with the cognitive dissonance when a family member comes out. 

 

There is one area in which the Mormon institution does digress from your standard Republican view: immigration. But most of the rank and file will still spit out the typical anti immigrant rhetoric. 

 

On 10/21/2022 at 5:10 PM, Fizzzzle said:

Basically the Mormon view of Christio-Nationalism does not always line up with the MAGA crowd

I don’t know about that. Mormons believe that God literally guided everyone from Christopher Columbus to the founding fathers of the United States so that Mormonism could appear. It’s not some hidden doctrine that people whisper about or theorize about. It’s literally a plain text reading of their holy books. 
 

There are some apocryphal beliefs and prophecies in the religion about Mormons or a Mormon saving the Constitution of the United States. You can imagine the salivating about that in the 2012 election. 
 

Additionally, groups like #DezNat keep gaining traction while the institution does nothing to directly denounce it.

[CastletonSnob]

Voters of color had mail-in ballots rejected at higher rates than whi…

WWW.TEXASTRIBUNE.ORG

---

Asian voters were most disproportionately affected by the new ID requirements included in voting restrictions passed by the 2021 Legislature, a Brennan Center for Justice analysis found.

Tell me more about how voter suppression isn't real.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

11 hours ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

 

Hmm. Well, I won’t discount your experience but I used to be Mormon and I can relate mine. I just moved out of the mormonest town of the mormonest county of the mormonest state about half a year ago. I still live in Utah but in a much less Mormon area. But that would still make it more Mormon populated than most areas of the country. I can only speak to generalities that I perceive and acknowledge that exceptions can be found just about anywhere. 
 

Anyways, when the 2016 election happened I’ll grant that Utah did not like Trump even though the state went to him. McMullin took a huge chunk of his support away. But I can say with surety: that after the election all the conservatives here got on the Trump train. It was back to typical levels in the 2020 election.
 

I think your friend’s experience is atypical unfortunately. A nuclear family is essential in Mormon doctrine more than any other religion I’d wager. Its highest rituals and ordinances center around it. Procreation between a man and a woman happens not just in this life but the next according to the doctrine. Thus, revilement towards non-heteronormativity in all its forms goes a bit beyond the standard Old Testament view that most Christians have of it. Though they are very good at avoiding direct hate speech about the LGBT community. So that’s a plus.
 

And it’s definitely good for your friend that her family didn’t mistreat her because of that specifically. I’d imagine they took the view that she’d just be celibate in this life and god would magically “fix” her in the next life or possibly this one. But I don’t know them so I can’t say that for sure. It’s just one of many ways individual Mormons have of mentally dealing with the cognitive dissonance when a family member comes out. 

 

There is one area in which the Mormon institution does digress from your standard Republican view: immigration. But most of the rank and file will still spit out the typical anti immigrant rhetoric. 

 

I don’t know about that. Mormons believe that God literally guided everyone from Christopher Columbus to the founding fathers of the United States so that Mormonism could appear. It’s not some hidden doctrine that people whisper about or theorize about. It’s literally a plain text reading of their holy books. 
 

There are some apocryphal beliefs and prophecies in the religion about Mormons or a Mormon saving the Constitution of the United States. You can imagine the salivating about that in the 2012 election. 
 

Additionally, groups like #DezNat keep gaining traction while the institution does nothing to directly denounce it.

Ok Mr Mormon expert explain this

 

[GeneticBlueprint]

5 minutes ago, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

Ok Mr Mormon expert explain this

 

Well, I’m always skeptical of how widespread stuff like this is. You always hear shit like this about BYU because it’s just a fucking weird Mormon place. So lots of stories are invented to explain the weirdness. I personally don’t know any Mormons that would consider any sort of “workaround” as not sinful. Mormons avoid “even the appearance of evil” and are very pharisaical in the sense that they’re always looking for extra rules to follow that will keep them that much further away from breaking the actual rule. Some of that is at the institutional level and some is at the personal level. For example, BYU didn’t serve caffeinated sodas on their campus for the longest time. Why? Because they’re not allowed to drink coffee. Does their doctrine forbid caffeine? No. But coffee has caffeine, ergo…

 

All that to say this too: both the act of fucking and the act of having an orgasm are equally sinful outside of marriage. So fucking an armpit isn’t getting you out of any trouble. Shrug

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

46 minutes ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

Well, I’m always skeptical of how widespread stuff like this is. You always hear shit like this about BYU because it’s just a fucking weird Mormon place. So lots of stories are invented to explain the weirdness. I personally don’t know any Mormons that would consider any sort of “workaround” as not sinful. Mormons avoid “even the appearance of evil” and are very pharisaical in the sense that they’re always looking for extra rules to follow that will keep them that much further away from breaking the actual rule. Some of that is at the institutional level and some is at the personal level. For example, BYU didn’t serve caffeinated sodas on their campus for the longest time. Why? Because they’re not allowed to drink coffee. Does their doctrine forbid caffeine? No. But coffee has caffeine, ergo…

 

All that to say this too: both the act of fucking and the act of having an orgasm are equally sinful outside of marriage. So fucking an armpit isn’t getting you out of any trouble. Shrug

You mean this one weird trick Mormon elders don’t want you to know about doesn’t actually work??

[unogueen]

armpit sex? en vogue? someone tell these fuck we're all monkeys.

[Ghost_MH]

4 hours ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

Well, I’m always skeptical of how widespread stuff like this is. You always hear shit like this about BYU because it’s just a fucking weird Mormon place. So lots of stories are invented to explain the weirdness. I personally don’t know any Mormons that would consider any sort of “workaround” as not sinful. Mormons avoid “even the appearance of evil” and are very pharisaical in the sense that they’re always looking for extra rules to follow that will keep them that much further away from breaking the actual rule. Some of that is at the institutional level and some is at the personal level. For example, BYU didn’t serve caffeinated sodas on their campus for the longest time. Why? Because they’re not allowed to drink coffee. Does their doctrine forbid caffeine? No. But coffee has caffeine, ergo…

 

All that to say this too: both the act of fucking and the act of having an orgasm are equally sinful outside of marriage. So fucking an armpit isn’t getting you out of any trouble. Shrug

 

I like to imagine someone out there is writing Mormon erotica and sometimes the details from their books trickle out onto Twitter and the press.

[BloodyHell]

On 10/21/2022 at 5:24 PM, CastletonSnob said:

I read somewhere that Texas has 3 million unregistered voters, the majority of them Black or Hispanic.

3 million is MORE than enough to win an election.

You're assuming the whole 3m are democrats, which isn't close to the truth. 

[BloodyHell]

On 10/23/2022 at 4:54 AM, GeneticBlueprint said:

 

Hmm. Well, I won’t discount your experience but I used to be Mormon and I can relate mine. I just moved out of the mormonest town of the mormonest county of the mormonest state about half a year ago. I still live in Utah but in a much less Mormon area. But that would still make it more Mormon populated than most areas of the country. I can only speak to generalities that I perceive and acknowledge that exceptions can be found just about anywhere. 
 

Anyways, when the 2016 election happened I’ll grant that Utah did not like Trump even though the state went to him. McMullin took a huge chunk of his support away. But I can say with surety: that after the election all the conservatives here got on the Trump train. It was back to typical levels in the 2020 election.
 

I think your friend’s experience is atypical unfortunately. A nuclear family is essential in Mormon doctrine more than any other religion I’d wager. Its highest rituals and ordinances center around it. Procreation between a man and a woman happens not just in this life but the next according to the doctrine. Thus, revilement towards non-heteronormativity in all its forms goes a bit beyond the standard Old Testament view that most Christians have of it. Though they are very good at avoiding direct hate speech about the LGBT community. So that’s a plus.
 

And it’s definitely good for your friend that her family didn’t mistreat her because of that specifically. I’d imagine they took the view that she’d just be celibate in this life and god would magically “fix” her in the next life or possibly this one. But I don’t know them so I can’t say that for sure. It’s just one of many ways individual Mormons have of mentally dealing with the cognitive dissonance when a family member comes out. 

 

There is one area in which the Mormon institution does digress from your standard Republican view: immigration. But most of the rank and file will still spit out the typical anti immigrant rhetoric. 

 

I don’t know about that. Mormons believe that God literally guided everyone from Christopher Columbus to the founding fathers of the United States so that Mormonism could appear. It’s not some hidden doctrine that people whisper about or theorize about. It’s literally a plain text reading of their holy books. 
 

There are some apocryphal beliefs and prophecies in the religion about Mormons or a Mormon saving the Constitution of the United States. You can imagine the salivating about that in the 2012 election. 
 

Additionally, groups like #DezNat keep gaining traction while the institution does nothing to directly denounce it.

What's #DezNat? 

What made you get out of mornonism? Are you still a believer, or did you become agnostic/athiest? 

 

This stuff is incredibly interesting to me.

[CastletonSnob]

Texas ranks 46TH in voting access.

 

Texas falls further in voting access rankings

WWW.AXIOS.COM

---

Ease of registration to vote and the availability of early voting were the most heavily weighted in the study.

 

Maybe remember this next time, before you criticize Texans for not being able to vote their politicians out.

[GeneticBlueprint]

6 hours ago, BloodyHell said:

What's #DezNat? 

What made you get out of mornonism? Are you still a believer, or did you become agnostic/athiest? 

 

This stuff is incredibly interesting to me.

 

Right now #DezNat is mostly a hashtag on Twitter, YouTube, etc. But it is growing and its proponents are becoming more vocal and brazen. It is short for Deseret Nation. 'Deseret' being the provisional State name of Utah when it first applied for statehood under the Mormon church's leader Brigham Young. The long and short of it is that the Utah territory under Brigham Young and his next two or three successors was quite violent towards unbelievers, apostates, and sinners. #DezNat drapes itself in the rhetoric, teachings, and imagery of the time and has been known to harass and threaten current day unbelievers, apostates, and sinners. A Christo-fascist state would be ideal for that crowd.

 

My trip out of mormonism couldn't be pinned down to any one thing, really. I've talked about it around these parts to some degree but to summarize: when you dedicate your spirituality, morals, money, and time (including a two year mission trip at your own expense) to an organization that you later find out to be deceitful and unethical your belief in the organization as a divine entity evaporates. Happy to elaborate further but I've already hijacked this thread enough and I'm sure some folks are sick of me talking about it. Haha.

[CastletonSnob]

THIS is how to qualify for mail-in voting in Texas:

 

• To be eligible to vote early by mail in Texas, you must:
• be 65 years or older; be sick or disabled;
• be out of the county on election day and during the period for early voting by personal appearance;
• or be expected to give birth within three weeks before or after Election Day;
• or be confined in jail, but otherwise eligible.

 

But tell me more about how Texans "just need to vote harder!", or how Texans "deserve" to suffer under their politicians, because of voter suppression.

[BloodyHell]

1 hour ago, CastletonSnob said:

THIS is how to qualify for mail-in voting in Texas:

 

• To be eligible to vote early by mail in Texas, you must:
• be 65 years or older; be sick or disabled;
• be out of the county on election day and during the period for early voting by personal appearance;
• or be expected to give birth within three weeks before or after Election Day;
• or be confined in jail, but otherwise eligible.

 

But tell me more about how Texans "just need to vote harder!", or how Texans "deserve" to suffer under their politicians, because of voter suppression.

You're still screaming at the sky dude. The point sbl was making is people have two years to prepare to vote. Should it be easier? Sure. But its not.