THE MORNING RANT: A Study Shows that Blue State Refugees Are Voting Heavily Republican in Tennessee

There is a great exodus of people fleeing the taxes, crime, and other left-wing pathologies of blue states for the freedom and culture of red states. This has caused much consternation among conservatives in fast-growing red states, who fear the refugees will vote left and ruin their new states, as they did in prior waves that flipped states such as Colorado and Arizona from Republican to Democrat.

There is some great news out of an analysis of new-to-Tennessee voters casting their first ballots after registering in Tennessee – they are voting overwhelmingly Republican. In this study, first time voters from California are casting more than three times as many Republican ballots as they are Democrat ballots.

Before I discuss the specifics of the analysis, I believe it is necessary to once again discuss the difference between “colonizers” and “refugees.” The colonizers tend to be left-wing voters relocating to a red state because of their job. That is what makes Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s recruitment of tech companies so distasteful. Abbott has recruited wave after wave of tech workers from California, and they generally bring their left-wing voting habits with them. It is terribly short-sighted for Texas to import anti-carbon voters who will enthusiastically kill off Texas’ petroleum and cattle industries. Refugees, by contrast, tend to be conservatives fleeing blue states. They vote Republican in their new state, making it even redder. Even better, they bring with them an appreciation for just how destructive 21st Century Democrats are when they gain power.

My growing neighborhood in a Tennessee suburb had so many Illinois license plates in 2021 and 2022 that you might have thought it was a Chicago suburb. During my “Welcome to the neighborhood” chats with them, at which time I asked what brought them to Tennessee, it became clear that pretty much all of them are refugees.

The Chattanooga Times Free Press just did an analysis of those who moved from out of state to Hamilton County, Tennessee (e.g. Chattanooga and surrounding suburbs) since January 1, 2023, totaling how many voted in this year’s Republican primaries versus how many voted in the Democrat primaries. It was a mega-landslide in favor of Republicans. (Or maybe that should be “maga-landslide.”)

“Hamilton County voter data shows ‘ruby red’ Tennessee is a big draw for those leaving 'Soviet Republic' of California” [Chattanooga Times Free Press – 8/31/2024]

Among those who have moved from California to Hamilton County in recent years and registered to vote since the beginning of 2023, 75% of them participated in a Republican primary this year — either the one in March or August. (Tennesseans don't align with a political party when registering to vote. Party affiliation is determined by which party ballot they chose in the latest primary.)

The article quoted Paul Chabot of the online site Conservative Move, who observed that blue state conservatives fleeing to Tennessee are heading for the suburbs, not the major cities, because even the cities are too Democrat.

Tennessee, especially its suburbs surrounding the urban cities, Chabot said, is among the top destinations for the tens of thousands of clients his company serves each year. "The big cities — Nashville, Knoxville and others — are run largely by Democrats, but once you get out of the city limits into the suburbs where most of our clients are moving," Chabot said, "these areas are ruby red."

Below is a chart that the Times Free Press compiled from records at the Hamilton County Election Commission. It shows which primary ballot was chosen by those new voters whose previous address was in California.

• 83 former Californians voted in the Republican primary.
• 26 former Californians voted in the Democrat primary.
• 1 General* ballot.

(*There was one ballot cast in a concurrent, non-partisan election for a municipal office, at which time the newcomer didn’t vote in either party’s primary.)

That is a ratio exceeding 3 to 1 in favor of Republicans. California transplants are making this county redder.

The ratio was approximately the same for Illinois transplants.

While these 110 Californians who moved to Hamilton County, Tennessee are not a huge number by themselves, their voting behavior is likely a representative sample of how blue state refugees vote, wherever their diaspora takes them.

Don’t forget, Florida moved from a “purple” tossup state to solidly Republican in less than a decade, due to the overwhelmingly Republican voting habits of the blue state refugees fleeing to the Sunshine State.

In a way, these refugees fleeing to red states are a little bit like the Cubans who escaped from Castro’s communism. They experienced first-hand just how destructive left-wing governance can be, and they have a passion to not let their new home states fall victim to the same political ruin that they fled. In a review of Roger L. Simon’s “American Refugees,” Mark Pulliam wrote, “Newly arrived transplants, acutely aware of the peril posed by leftist policies, often find themselves acting like Paul Revere, warning the cliquish locals of the dangers of passivity and complacency. Far from posing a threat to red states, refugees from blue states, Simon posits, are in fact ‘a cavalry come to rescue the red states from themselves.’”

Liberty cannot be taken for granted. I am grateful that blue state refugees are making free states more conservative.

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

posted by Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM

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