Weird Voting in New Mexico

Vincent J. Curtis

18 Dec 20

New Mexico was another one of those states I thought Trump might flip in 2020.  Evidently, he did too as he put in a campaign stop in that state, and the head of the Republican Party in New Mexico said just before the election that Trump would carry his state.  Trump didn’t.

New Mexico has been a reliably Democrat voting state for several cycles now, and Fox News called the state for the Democrat in both 2016 and 2020 within minutes of the polls closing.

Why should Trump carry New Mexico?  I thought the Wall and his appeal to Hispanic voters would siphon enough support from the Democrat that he would pull it off.

The results of New Mexico’s presidential returns since 2008 and tabulated below:

New Mexico   2008 2012 2016 2020

Democrat 472,442     408,312     385,234     501,614

Republican 346,832     331,915     319,667     401,894

Barack Obama was the Democratic candidate in 2008 and 2012.  He was new, untarnished, progressive, promised hope and change, and seemed to mean the end of racism in America.  John McCain was the Republican contender and had been Senator from neighboring state Arizona for several decades.  He was well known to New Mexicans, a war hero, all scuffed up politically from his decades in Washington, and his health was questioned.  New Mexico’s preference for Democrats is illustrated in 2008.

In 2012, Barack Obama again carried the Democratic banner.  He was better known, less liked, and people were less enthusiastic about him.  Mitt Romney was from Utah, a Mormon running in a state of a lot of members of the LDS.  New Mexicans were less enthusiastic about Romney than they were about McCain.  Both candidates, Obama and Romney, showed declines in vote tallies from 2008.

Hillary Clinton was another progressive hopeful carrying the Democrat banner, and if elected she would be the first woman president.  The vote for her showed a further drop off in Democrat support from 2012.  I’s not sure New Mexicans care much about progressive ideas or radical social change.

Donald Trump in 2016 was a property developer from New York City, and was widely considered an off-the-wall candidate who stood no chance of winning.  His promise to build a border wall proved unavailing among New Mexicans, and support for the Republican candidate followed the Democrat in decline in 2016.  Trump’s support in 2016 was even lower than Romney’s in 2012.

Something happened in 2020.  Trump built his Wall, the economy boomed, and folks at the lower end of the wage scale benefited the most.  Unemployment among Hispanics fell to the lowest percentage in the records.  True, the pandemic happened, but it wasn’t the catastrophe in New Mexico that it was in other states.  The voting patterns in New Mexico do not show a strong interest in so-called social justice issues.  Trump ought to do better, and with Joe Biden as the Democrat candidate, there is no reason to suppose he would do much better than Hillary and certainly not better than Obama in 2008.

Yet, that is exactly what happened.  Trump increased his vote total by 83,000, or 26 percent, easily eclipsing McCain’s high water mark for Republicans in 2008, and would have beaten Hillary in 2016 with that vote total.  However, Joe Biden increased the Democrat vote total by 117,000, and increase of 30 percent over Hillary’s 2016 count, and easily surpassing Obama’s 2008 numbers.

The question arises what was the dynamic that produced such enthusiasm for old, plain Joe Biden?  You would think that enthusiasm for Trump would draw votes from Democrats, but Biden seems to have found a hitherto untapped well of support for Democrat over the Republican.  One can understand the rise in support for Trump, but the social dynamics of New Mexico don’t explain why Biden would do so well, period.  Why would such support turn out just when the Republican looked like he might carry the state?  I get that Trump can generate as much hostility as he can enthusiasm, but the normal progressive motivations that might drive people in the coastal states doesn’t apply to New |Mexico.  What would drive New Mexican Democrats into a voting frenzy, never hitherto witnessed, with a candidates giving so little reason to be enthusiastic about?  It was almost as if Democrats knew Trump could carry the state, and they were bound to stop him.  But that motivation shouldn't be that powerful in New Mexico.

The 2020 presidential vote in New Mexico looks weird.

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