Deep Dive into the Demographic Dynamics of NC's Districts: Volume 1--Congressional

In a previous post, I noted that the dynamics that both Democrats and Republicans were going into with this year's mid-term elections would be based on both demographic, partisan, and regional aspects. This blog post dives deeper into the legislative districts, since the Old North State is experiencing is "once in a blue moon" election cycle with no marquee state-wide race, such as U.S. Senate or governor's contest (a reminder: NC governors are elected in presidential years, unlike many chief executives in the states).

In analyzing the congressional (this post) and state legislative districts (next post), I draw upon the March 3, 2018 data "download" from the NC State Board of Elections of the over 6.8 million active and inactive voters on the rolls. Using this information, I can draw out the various dynamics (party registration, race, age/generation, region, etc.) to analyze and see what trends are evident in the numbers of voters. Of course, these numbers will change/shift between now and November's general election, but this will set a baseline of sorts for future analysis of the voter pool.

First, looking at the state's congressional districts, which look like this (and may still change, thanks to a variety of lawsuits over the districts):

For those not from North Carolina, Republicans hold 10 congressional districts while Democrats hold 3 districts (the 1st, 4th, and 12th, of which the 1st and 12th are generally considered majority-minority districts at this time).

Within the 13 congressional districts, the partisan/party affiliation breaks down as:

U.S. House District	Registered Democrat	Registered Unaffiliated	Registered Republican	Registered Libertarian
1	314,031	130,374	80,953	1,965
2	192,894	173,598	189,939	3,136
3	176,493	156,146	161,596	2,730
4	247,503	213,477	112,507	3,782
5	168,619	149,948	190,520	2,454
6	188,179	144,899	168,001	2,184
7	191,403	160,622	174,840	2,516
8	176,627	156,726	166,723	2,566
9	200,961	153,431	161,862	2,026
10	167,824	161,445	183,133	2,545
11	160,328	183,733	188,032	2,932
12	274,881	173,992	110,278	3,517
13	189,431	153,667	181,230	2,425

Thus, the percentage within each congressional district by partisan registered voter composition is:

U.S. House District	Registered Democrat	Registered Unaffiliated	Registered Republican	Registered Libertarian
1	60%	25%	15%	0%
2	34%	31%	34%	1%
3	36%	31%	33%	1%
4	43%	37%	19%	1%
5	33%	29%	37%	0%
6	37%	29%	33%	0%
7	36%	30%	33%	0%
8	35%	31%	33%	1%
9	39%	30%	31%	0%
10	33%	31%	36%	0%
11	30%	34%	35%	1%
12	49%	31%	20%	1%
13	36%	29%	34%	0%

It has been traditional "lore" in North Carolina political circles that once a legislative district hits 35 percent Republican registration, the district tends to flip to the GOP in voting behavior. Currently, three congressional districts are at 35 percent or greater, with seven between 33 and 35 percent, and one (the 9th, out of Mecklenburg down to Cumberland counties), at 31 percent.

In terms of racial and ethnic dynamics within each congressional district:

U.S. House District	White Non-Hispanic Voter	Black or African-American Voter	Hispanic‎/ Latino Voter	All other races‎/ ethnicities‎/ unknown
1	240,866	240,357	10,284	35,816
2	397,460	108,276	15,941	37,890
3	359,332	106,032	9,806	21,794
4	353,041	125,745	19,306	79,177
5	398,858	77,451	12,598	22,634
6	359,469	107,299	12,338	24,157
7	389,291	102,443	10,814	26,833
8	325,224	124,519	17,543	35,355
9	342,058	102,967	12,870	60,385
10	418,793	62,709	9,387	24,058
11	489,689	15,697	7,006	22,633
12	267,370	222,368	24,504	48,426
13	363,664	122,279	11,438	29,372
State	4,705,115	1,518,142	173,835	468,530

In terms of percentages within each congressional district based on race and ethnicity:

U.S. House District	White Non-Hispanic Voter	Black or African-American Voter	Hispanic‎/ Latino Voter	All other races‎/ ethnicities‎/ unknown
1	46%	46%	2%	7%
2	71%	19%	3%	7%
3	72%	21%	2%	4%
4	61%	22%	3%	14%
5	78%	15%	2%	4%
6	71%	21%	2%	5%
7	74%	19%	2%	5%
8	65%	25%	3%	7%
9	66%	20%	2%	12%
10	81%	12%	2%	5%
11	92%	3%	1%	4%
12	48%	40%	4%	9%
13	69%	23%	2%	6%
State	69%	22%	3%	7%

In terms of racial dynamics, two Republican held districts--the 8th and 13th--have slightly higher than state-wide averages of black/African-American voters.

By regionalism (meaning, urban, suburban, and rural county voters, as defined by the U.S. OMB):

	Urban County Voter	Suburban County Voter	Rural County Voter
1	291,256	-	236,067	527,323
2	342,833	126,978	89,756	559,567
3	235,840	16,783	244,342	496,965
4	577,269	-	-	577,269
5	261,731	78,729	171,081	511,541
6	223,557	228,338	51,368	503,263
7	240,080	178,689	110,612	529,381
8	157,105	222,254	123,283	502,642
9	206,211	168,397	143,672	518,280
10	187,184	146,648	181,115	514,947
11	211,568	143,446	180,011	535,025
12	562,668	-	-	562,668
13	241,028	285,725	-	526,753
State	3,738,330	1,595,987	1,531,307	6,865,624

And by percentages of regionalism within the congressional district:

	Urban County Voter	Suburban County Voter	Rural County Voter
1	55%	0%	45%
2	61%	23%	16%
3	47%	3%	49%
4	100%	0%	0%
5	51%	15%	33%
6	44%	45%	10%
7	45%	34%	21%
8	31%	44%	25%
9	40%	32%	28%
10	36%	28%	35%
11	40%	27%	34%
12	100%	0%	0%
13	46%	54%	0%
State	54%	23%	22%

One of the interesting numbers are in the 6th, 8th, 13th, and 7th districts, which contain over a third of their voters in suburban counties, with the 9th district just slightly under a third of its voters in suburban counties. 

Another analysis is by generations within the congressional districts:

U.S. House District	Generation Z (up to 21 YO)	Millennials (22-37 YO)	Generation X (38-53 YO)	Baby Boomer (54-73 YO)	Greatest‎/ Silent (74-111 YO)
1	29,885	160,273	126,741	159,209	50,972
2	31,771	137,383	174,525	172,330	43,512
3	22,358	129,510	120,941	169,642	54,452
4	38,624	198,198	158,711	144,298	37,433
5	30,178	130,379	125,370	166,240	57,878
6	24,256	118,105	134,199	169,213	56,633
7	23,720	127,270	129,791	185,982	62,521
8	25,264	138,257	137,208	152,940	48,694
9	27,914	126,557	153,439	162,020	48,097
10	22,883	122,879	137,279	173,859	58,043
11	22,286	118,506	128,648	190,196	75,192
12	29,279	195,634	166,889	137,755	33,105
13	30,046	140,526	137,310	164,037	53,226
State	358,464	1,843,477	1,831,051	2,147,721	679,758

And by percentages for generations within congressional districts:

U.S. House District	Generation Z (up to 21 YO)	Millennials (22-37 YO)	Generation X (38-53 YO)	Baby Boomer (54-73 YO)	Greatest‎/ Silent (74-111 YO)
1	6%	30%	24%	30%	10%
2	6%	25%	31%	31%	8%
3	4%	26%	24%	34%	11%
4	7%	34%	27%	25%	6%
5	6%	25%	25%	32%	11%
6	5%	23%	27%	34%	11%
7	4%	24%	25%	35%	12%
8	5%	28%	27%	30%	10%
9	5%	24%	30%	31%	9%
10	4%	24%	27%	34%	11%
11	4%	22%	24%	36%	14%
12	5%	35%	30%	24%	6%
13	6%	27%	26%	31%	10%
State	5%	27%	27%	31%	10%

While 32.1 percent of the state's registered voters are under the age of 37 (Millennials and now Generation Z), four districts--the 1st, 4th and 12th (all held by Democrats) and the 13th (held by a Republican freshmen incumbent)--have higher percentages than the state of younger voters. 

Finally, much has been made about the 2018 mid-term elections may be another "Year of the Woman," especially among voters. The gender breakdowns by congressional district are:

U.S. House Districts	Female	Male	Unknown‎/ Unreported
1	285,064	227,025	15,233
2	291,899	255,129	12,539
3	263,534	225,228	8,203
4	297,551	253,244	26,474
5	270,805	230,709	10,027
6	268,773	226,480	8,010
7	278,597	236,841	13,932
8	266,114	224,158	12,369
9	274,335	233,731	10,211
10	272,015	233,230	9,701
11	281,031	246,832	7,162
12	301,243	247,811	13,614
13	283,057	237,342	6,352
State	3,634,018	3,077,760	153,827

And by percentages:

U.S. House Districts	Female	Male	Unknown‎/ Unreported
1	54%	43%	3%
2	52%	46%	2%
3	53%	45%	2%
4	52%	44%	5%
5	53%	45%	2%
6	53%	45%	2%
7	53%	45%	3%
8	53%	45%	2%
9	53%	45%	2%
10	53%	45%	2%
11	53%	46%	1%
12	54%	44%	2%
13	54%	45%	1%
State	53%	45%	2%

The congressional districts with the highest female percentages of voters are the 1st, 12th, and 13th, all with 54 percent of their registered voters as women. As is nationally the case, women tend to be a higher percentage of voter turnout in North Carolina elections. 

One of the final aspects that I would point to with North Carolina's congressional districts are the correlation between the 2016 vote for the Republican congressional candidates and Donald Trump's vote in the district. Here is a scatterplot, with a "line of fit," between the Trump vote in the district and the GOP congressional candidate's vote:

As shown by the line of fit and the R squared value of 0.976, Trump's vote can explain a great deal of the vote for the GOP congressional candidate in 2016. This close connection shows that partisan loyalty is very strong from the top of the ballot down to the congressional level, and if Trump's performance or approval is depressed in the state, the impact may be important to watch in North Carolina for Republican congressional candidates (some further thoughts on that can be found in this post). 

With Larry Sabato's Center for Politics recently changing (as of March 8) two NC congressional districts--the 9th and 13th--from "Likely Republican" to "Lean Republican" classification, it will be critical to watch the ultimate turnouts in the various districts to see how November may play out, especially among key demographic groups. 

I'll be doing a similar analysis (probably without charts, due to 170 seats) of the North Carolina General Assembly districts, both state house and state senate, and will be posting those numbers in the next article. Thanks for reading.