The San Joaquin Valley Electoral Politics Project, Part 2: 2012-2018 House Results
2012-2020 San Joaquin Valley Congressional Districts: Information and analysis of each district's attributes were found by spending hours on GovTrack's Congressional Districts map, which spatially overlays District boundaries relative to county and city lines. Like with the first post in this series, my personal experiences living in the Valley combined with spending time examining the online Statistical Atlas, Google Maps, and New York Times' 2016 precinct results map gave me insight to produce descriptions of each district in the Valley, both politically and socio-demographically.
CA-04: Based in suburban Sacramento, district stretches down the Sierra Nevada mountain range and foothill communities to the west. Within the San Joaquin Valley counties, CA-4 covers the eastern ("foothill" and "mountain") portions of Madera and Fresno counties. Both areas are sparsely-populated and are very Republican. The district has been held by Rep. Tom McClintock (R) throughout the time period studied on this post.
Image Source: "File:California US Congressional District 4 (since 2013).tif." Wikimedia Commons, 22 Mar. 2014, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_US_Congressional_District_4_(since_2013).tif. Accessed 2 Sept. 2020.
CA-09: This moderately-blue district encompasses much of the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta and the communities around it, including Stockton, Mountain House, Lodi, and Lathrop. Part of the district also extends into suburban portions of eastern Contra Costa county. The district has been held by Rep. Jerry McNerney (D) throughout the time period studied on this post.
Image Source: "File:California US Congressional District 9 (since 2013).tif." Wikimedia Commons, 22 Mar. 2014, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_US_Congressional_District_9_(since_2013).tif. Accessed 2 Sept. 2020.
CA-10: Coming at last to a district completely within the Valley, we are arrive in CA-10, which encompasses the whole of Stanislaus County and the Bay Area commuter exurbs of Tracy and Manteca in San Joaquin County. In recent presidential and midterm cycles, this district has been a perennial battleground due to its purple nature, although it voted narrowly for both Obama 2012 and Clinton (Kondik, "HOUSE UPDATE," Kondik, "House 2018"). The district was held by Rep. Jeff Denham (R) from 2013 to 2019, and by Rep. Josh Harder (D) from 2019 through 2021.
Image Source: "File:California US Congressional District 10 (since 2013).tif." Wikimedia Commons, 22 Mar. 2014, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_US_Congressional_District_10_(since_2013).tif. Accessed 2 Sept. 2020.
CA-16: Moving further south, this district includes all of Merced County, the urbanized portion of Madera County (including the only incorporated cities, Madera and Chowchilla), and a segment of Fresno County. The Fresno County chunk includes the suburbs west of CA-99, inner-city Fresno going up to Ashlan Avenue, and most of Southeast Fresno's suburbs. The district has been held by Rep. Jim Costa (D) throughout the time period studied on this post.
Image Source: "File:California US Congressional District 16 (since 2013).tif." Wikimedia Commons, 22 Mar. 2014, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_US_Congressional_District_16_(since_2013).tif. Accessed 2 Sept. 2020.
CA-21: This oddly-shaped district is designed to be majority-Hispanic, and as such, elect a Hispanic Representative to Congress (Ellis). However, turnout in CA-21 is very low (even by national standards) due to a combination of its rural, low-income, majority-minority, and agricultural nature (Landsman). CA-21 covers western and south-central portions of Fresno County, all of Kings County, and a portion of Kern County. Parts within Fresno include most of the rural majority-Hispanic farming towns and smaller cities that have recently turned into exurbs of Fresno (such as Kerman, Fowler, Selma, and Sanger). The portion within Kern County also includes rural majority-minority communities and parts of inner-city Bakersfield. A small section of Tulare County is also included in the district, which contains similar small-town communities along CA-99 south of Visalia. The district was held by Rep. David Valadao (R) from 2013 to 2019, and by Rep. T.J. Cox (D) from 2019 through 2021. As will be discussed later, Valadao was able to win this otherwise-heavily Democratic district for three elections, and almost held on in 2018. It has been speculated that a combination of low turnout, Valadao's focus on local policy issues (especially water), and his appeal to enough Democratic-leaning Hispanics to win could be behind his electoral success in the area (Ellis).
Image Source: "File:California US Congressional District 21 (since 2013).tif." Wikimedia Commons, 22 Mar. 2014, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_US_Congressional_District_21_(since_2013).tif. Accessed 2 Sept. 2020.
CA-22: This district stretches across a chunk of Tulare and Fresno counties, taking in largely suburban and exurban territory that is usually very Republican. However, as will be discussed later, this district swung from very Republican in 2016 to near-purple in 2018 at the House-level, and may continue to shift towards the blue. The Tulare County portion of the district takes in the urbanized portion of the county, including Visalia and Tulare. The Fresno County portion takes in portions of inner-city Fresno, the area around Fresno State University, most of Fresno proper's more conservative northern and eastern suburbs, the dark-red suburb of Clovis, and Republican exurban territory to the north and east (including Friant, sitting below Millerton Dam). Also included in this district is one of the few Democratic precincts in North Fresno, Pinedale, a majority-Hispanic community that historically served as an assembly center for Japanese-Americans during the early part of the WW2 internment. The district has been held by Rep. Devin Nunes (R) throughout the time period studied on this post.
Image Source: "File:California US Congressional District 22 (since 2013).tif." Wikimedia Commons, 22 Mar. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_US_Congressional_District_22_(since_2013).tif." Accessed 2 Sept. 2020.
CA-23: Home to House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R), this district takes in the remaining portions of Tulare and Kern Counties, including most of Bakersfield and all of the foothill and mountain communities. A portion of this district includes the High Desert part of Kern County, which is thinly-populated, and also includes a small sliver of northern Los Angeles County. The district has been held by Rep. (and current House Minority Leader) Kevin McCarthy (R) throughout the time period studied on this post.
Image Source: "File:California US Congressional District 23 (since 2013).tif." Wikimedia Commons, 22 Mar. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_US_Congressional_District_23_(since_2013).tif. Accessed 2 Sept. 2020.
Data Collection: Like last time, all election results used on today's post were retrieved from the California Secretary of State's website. Specific results were self-calculated in Excel. Data visualizations and tables were self-created with Tableau and Excel based on such data. In Tables 1 and 2 below, only results from SJV counties are included. As noted earlier, two districts (CA-04 and CA-09) are highlighted with an asterisk (*) on both tables to signify that both have non-SJV portions that are not included in the calculations on Table 2.
Table 1: 2012-2020 San Joaquin Valley House Representation
Table 2: Combined 2012-2018 Results Chart
2012-2018 Results: Table 1 above shows the history of Congressional members representing the San Joaquin Valley's House districts. Table 2 breaks down 2012-2018 House election results by districts and counties, including breaking down district results by county portions. For example, in the 2016 House elections, the CA-21 Democratic candidate lost the election 43%-57%, while they won the Kern County portion 56%-44%, lost the Kings County portion 29%-71%, lost the Fresno County portion 60%-40%, and lost the Tulare County portion 55%-45%. Between both tables, names and results are color-coded based on which party each representative in each Congress belongs to (Table 1), and which party's candidates won the vote per county and district (Table 2) (i.e. Blue = Democrat, Red = Republican). The bottom-right corner box indicates the valley-wide result. Note that in 2012, CA-23 Republican incumbent Kevin McCarthy faced a candidate whose partisan affiliation was "No Party Preference" ("Statement of Vote: November 6, 2012," 31). However, as McCarthy won both sections (i.e. Kern and Tulare County) of his district, this is not taken into account in the results above. Other than this election, all of the other SJV House elections during this time period featured one Democrat and one Republican.
2012: Coming off the 2010 Census, the Valley's districts were redrawn as part of decennial redistricting. Despite Obama cruising to another presidential term, Republican House candidates won the Valley 57%-43%. Their most notable victory was Republican David Valadao in CA-21, who won the district 58%-42% while Obama received 55% on the same day. Despite being redistricted from a more red district to a light-blue Obama district, Rep. Jeff Denham won CA-10 by 6% (Kondik, "Hard Targets"). Finally, Rep. Jim Costa ran and won in CA-16 after being redistricted out of CA-21's 2000s version (Kondik, "California Dreamin'").
2014: In addition to the nationwide results, 2014 was the low point for SJV House Democrats up and down the valley, with the Republicans winning the total Valley House vote 68%-32%. As profiled in last Thursday's post, Rep. Jim Costa won by 1.8% after initially trailing on election night. Further north, Rep. Jerry McNerney also narrowly won re-election in CA-10. In fact, the Republican wave in the Valley was so extreme that every county voted for Republican House candidates, including blue-trending San Joaquin. Now-blue Merced County voted 9% for Republican CA-16 House candidate Johnny Tacherra. Reps. Denham and Valadao survived the 2014 wave despite occupying Obama 2012 districts (Kondik and Skelley).
2016: The 2016 House results in the San Joaquin Valley generally trended back to the 2012 results, as House Republicans won the valley 57%-43%, with no change in representation. The only notable result this year was Rep. Denham's survival in CA-10, which was considered surprising considering the District voted for Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and because Denham had been significantly targeted by national Democrats that cycle (Kondik, "House Crossover").
2018: With a Republican in the White House, Democrats were salivating about the 2018 midterms, as they realized the potential for a favorable midterm. In the San Joaquin Valley, this dream turned true, as Democratic House candidates lost the valley 49%-51%, the closest of the last few cycles. After being on Democrats' target lists for three cycles, Rep. Denham lost to Democrat Josh Harder, who also won the 10th's portion of San Joaquin County for the first time since redistricting. Further south, Rep. Valadao was initially leading on election night, but lost in a shocking upset after all mail ballots were counted to T.J. Cox (D) (White), who had run for Congress in 2006 against then-Republican incumbent George Radanovich (R, CA-19) (Symon). The most notable result of the night was the close re-election of controversial ex-House Intelligence Committee chair Devin Nunes (R) in suburban CA-22. In the past three cycles, Nunes had won by over 30%, and even by almost 50% in 2014. But in 2018, his race became unexpectedly competitive against ex-Fresno County prosecutor Andrew Janz (D), who raised a substantial amount of money as Nunes' controversies piled up in 2017 and 2018 (Daniels). In the end, Nunes won re-election by 5.5%, with the Fresno County portion of the district (Fresno suburbs and exurbs) voting 68%-32% for Nunes in 2016 and 52%-48% for Nunes in 2018, a swing of 32% towards the Democrats. The district as a whole swung 30% towards Janz compared to the 2016 results, as seen in Table 1 above. As a result of Cox's and Janz's midterm performances, House Democrats won Fresno County's total vote 52%-48%, a swing of 18% from 2016.
Conclusion and Implications: Looking at the San Joaquin Valley's 2012-2018 House results reveals several interesting trends that align with other results talked about in the last post and will be talked about in future posts. In particular, the Valley's recent movement towards the Democrats after being a Republican stronghold before is apparent when comparing 2018 to 2016. Diving deeper, Fresno County voting for House Democratic candidates further shows this shift in action, especially considering how heavily Republican it voted in the 2012, 2014, and 2016 House elections. Furthermore, the three northern counties that have recently come within the Bay Area's "sphere of influence" were already light-blue in 2010, and except for the 2014 midterms, have been trending even more blue since. Finally, not all of the results are good for Democrats. While the southern three counties (Kern, Kings, Tulare) have also shifted recently, the shift has not been as pronounced as the "Northern Three" or Fresno County, and all three continue to be solidly Republican. In fact, one of the major themes that will be noted throughout this series is that in modern elections, Kern's strong Republican voting support often tilts the Valley as a whole towards the red, even if Democrats do well in the "Northern Three" and Fresno.
Data Sources:
"Statement of Vote: November 6, 2012 General Election." California Secretary of State Debra Bowen, 6 Jan. 2011, elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/sov/2012-general/sov-complete.pdf, 27-31. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
"Statement of Vote: November 4, 2014 General Election." California Secretary of State Debra Bowen, 12 Dec. 2014, elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/sov/2014-general/pdf/2014-complete-sov.pdf, 44-49. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
"Statement of Vote: November 8, 2016 General Election." California Secretary of State Alex Padilla, 16 Dec. 2016, elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/sov/2016-general/sov/2016-complete-sov.pdf, 27-32. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
"Statement of Vote: November 6, 2018 General Election." California Secretary of State Alex Padilla, 14 Dec. 2018, elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/sov/2018-general/sov/2018-complete-sov.pdf, 49-54. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
Works Cited:
Daniels, Jeff. "Trump loyalist Devin Nunes facing tighter House race in California as Democratic rival Andrew Janz rises in the polls." CNBC, 3 Sept. 2018, www.cnbc.com/2018/08/31/trump-loyalist-devin-nunes-faces-tighter-house-race-in-california.html. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
Ellis, John. "After dominating Renteria, some say Valadao may be unbeatable in 21st Congressional District." The Fresno Bee, 22 Nov. 2014, www.fresnobee.com/news/politics-government/election/article19527582.html. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
Kondik, Kyle. "Hard targets?" Sabato's Crystal Ball, centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/hard-targets/. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
---. "House 2018: Crossover appeal." Sabato's Crystal Ball, 9 Feb. 2017, centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/house-2018-crossover-appeal/. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
---. "House Update: Democrats California Dreamin’." Sabato's Crystal Ball, centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/house-update-democrats-california-dreamin/. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
---. "House 2018: Health Care Vote Gives Democrats Another Midterm Argument." Sabato's Crystal Ball, 11 May 2017, centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/house-2018-health-care-vote-gives-democrats-another-midterm-argument/. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
---. "HOUSE UPDATE: The Waiting Game." Sabato's Crystal Ball, 11 Feb. 2016, centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/house-update-the-waiting-game/. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
Kondik, Kyle, and Geoffrey Skelley. "14 from ’14: Quick Takes on the Midterm." Sabato's Crystal Ball, 13 Nov. 2018, centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/14-from-14-quick-takes-on-the-midterm/. Accessed 27 Aug. 2020.
Landsman, Theodore. "How to Get Elected to Congress With Only 50,595 Votes." FairVote, 15 Mar. 2017, www.fairvote.org/how_to_get_elected_to_congress_with_only_50_595_votes. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
Symon, Evan. "2020 March Primary Preview: 21st Congressional District." California Globe, 19 Feb. 2020, californiaglobe.com/section-2/2020-march-primary-preview-21st-congressional-district/. Accessed 3 Sept. 2020.
White, Jeremy. "Dems flip another California district after Valadao concedes." Politico, 6 Dec. 2018, www.politico.com/story/2018/12/06/tj-cox-wins-california-house-21-1025859. Accessed 27 Aug. 2020.
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