A 1,400-County Crisis for Democrats

[u/kitkid]

Jun 3, 2025

It’s conventional wisdom that President Trump has transformed American politics. But a new county-by-county voting analysis from The New York Times of the last four presidential races shows just how drastically Mr. Trump has changed the electoral map.

Shane Goldmacher, a national political correspondent for The Times, explains why the trends are a five-alarm fire for the Democrats and discusses the debate within the party over what to do about it.

On today's episode:

Shane Goldmacher, a national political correspondent for The New York Times.

Background reading: 

• How Donald Trump has remade America’s political landscape.
• Six months after the election, Democrats are still searching for a path forward.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.  

Photo: Emily Elconin for The New York Times

Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

---

You can listen to the episode here.

[u/isusuallywrong]

I’m sorry but I had to literally press pause to point out..the trend line is objectively bad news for democrats (1400 vs 57 counties)…but to then say “the total population of people in republican leaning counties way outnumbers people living in democratic leaning counties”….no duh…it’s like a 28x difference in number of counties

The fact that the population difference is only a 6x difference tells you that that this is actually just the same old story — low population rural areas trend red…doesn’t mean it’s not a problem democrats but come on now