Political Parties in Texas
This Week
Political Parties
On Primary Election Day last year, Republican and Democratic voters went go to the polls to help choose their party nominees for races from United States Senate to their local justice of the peace.
The truly devoted, though, realized that their job wasn't quite over when they cast their vote.
After the pools close, some voters (way too few, in my opinion) return to their polling place for a meeting – Republicans call it a precinct convention, Democrats a precinct caucus. The main task on the agenda is to choose delegates to senate district conventions (generally the third Saturday after the primary), where those delegates will choose delegates to attend the state convention in May.
The other task is to consider any resolutions the precinct wishes to adopt telling the state convention what they would like to see in the party's official platform.
A party platform is that party's official statement of beliefs. While most candidates don't pay any attention to it, it's always interesting to see what the party's true believers are thinking, and how those things change from year to year.
Our assignment this week will look at the 2020 platforms of the two major political parties.
Elections and Political Participation
Last November, Americans voted in record numbers in the presidential election – possibly the most divisive in our nation's history. Nationally, 67% of citizens 18 and older participated – a full five percentage points higher than in the 2016 election.
Voter turnout varies widely, though – from region to region and from one group of citizens to another.
Turnout in Texas was 66%, slightly less than for the country as a whole, but the highest for the state in 30 years.
Harris County's turnout was slightly higher than both – just over 68%.
We can divide up citizens in different ways and see differences in voter behavior, and there are some trends that we see over and over. Older people vote more than younger people. Homeowners vote more than renters. Whites and Blacks vote more than Hispanics and Asians. People with more years of education vote more than those with less.
What is voter turnout like where you live, and how does it compare? Your assignment this week will take a look.
Cool Link Of The Day
Texas Democratic Party election analysis
The 2020 election was a mixed bag for Democrats. President Donald Trump carried Texas, while losing nationwide, but challenger Joe Biden did better in Texas than Hillary Clinton did in the 2016 election, and far better than Barack Obama did in either of his elections. Republicans did better with Hispanic voters than Democrats anticipated. Here's their internal analysis:
https://www.texasdemocrats.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/2020-Texas-Election-Data-Analysis.pdf
