Happy 2021 Election Twitter! As a special gift to my Illinois friends I present three new maps and a short thread below. Chicagoland is one of my new favorite regions to study politically. I hope you all enjoy the holiday! #ElectionTwitter
IL6 - Drawn to be a Republican vote sink, the 6th is now becoming reliably Democratic. It's currently held by Democrat Sean Casten, who was just won a second term over Fmr St. Rep Jeanne Ives, who won only the Lake County portion. Casten's margin was slightly greater this year.
IL10 - Once the epitome of Lake County's traditional Republicanism, the 10th has since become solidly Democratic. The last Republican to hold the seat, Bob Dold, lost in 2016. Schneider, a moderate, has won easily in 2018 and 2020.
IL14 - The reddest of the seats surrounding Chicago, the 14th was flipped by Democrat Lauren Underwood back in 2018. Underwood won re-election narrowly this year and currently seems to be a rising star in the Democratic Caucus.
Interestingly, Underwood is one of many African American Democrats representing majority White seats. Others include Antonio Delgado (NY-19) and Joe Neguse (CO-2). Besides Steve Cohen, the inverse situation is not very common.
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Day 1: Illinois-3 - This year progressive Democrat Marie Newman significantly underperformed Dan Lipinski's bloated 2018 margin in the district. Please follow the thread below for detailed analysis of this fascinating Chicago-based district. #ElectionTwitter
It all began earlier this year when Marie Newman successfully defeated long-time Congressman Dan Lipinski in a primary rematch. Lipinski had served since his father's retirement in 2005 and had formed a record as one of the most conservative members of the Democratic caucus.
Lipinski's record was in many ways perfectly representative of the district's strong population of working class whites. (Ex cops, firefighters, and other union workers) He opposed abortion, and at first stood against same-sex marriage, but he always backed organized labor.
QGIS Learning Thread Below! Are you interested in learning how to map? I’m going to go step by step to produce a Texas Map. Follow along and you will be able to try it yourself. #ElectionTwitter
Step 1: You want to download a shapefile that properly fits your data. In this case we are testing a Texas VTD file. This is trial and error, but it is important to have a shapefile that matches. In your downloads, drag and drop the .shx file onto the QGIS Canvas and it will show
Step 2: Next you have to find your data. In this case we are using the full 2018 General Election Returns. Load your CSV file into excel and save it as a Workbook. Make sure to always save your file on QGIS and Excel in case it crashes.