People seemed to enjoy the “visualized” post, so here’s one more. This is a map comparing the performance of Hagan 2014 vs. Marshall 2010. As an incumbent with the full support of the national party and tens of millions of dollars on her side, Hagan was always going to do better than Marshall, the question was how much. Burr won in 2010 by 11.76%, so if that’s our starting point, Hagan had to climb out of a deep hole. In the end, she closed the gap in the GOP margin of victory by about 10%. Close, but no cigar.

The counties in the two darkest blue shades are where the swing to Hagan exceeded what she needed to win. If the swing toward her in the rest of the state had been as large, she would be getting ready for her second term right now. (Click image for full size.)

New Hanover County was where Hagan most improved on Marshall’s performance. Marshall lost there in 2010 by 19 points; Hagan lost it by just a little more than a tenth of a percentage point. Neighboring Brunswick County also saw a large Democratic swing. I haven’t had time to investigate why Democrats did so much better in the Wilmington area this time around, but I’d guess Democratic turnout there was especially low in 2010. What’s particularly surprising is that Sen. Michael Lee won his race by double-digits despite the improved performance by Democrats there.

The next two counties that saw the largest swings to Hagan were Guilford and Forsyth in the Piedmont Triad. That’s much more easily explainable: Burr is from that area and ran particularly strong there, and Hagan benefited from the same geographic ties in 2014. It appears that geography also played a role in the large Democratic swing in Rockingham County.

The big urban counties, including Buncombe, Mecklenburg, and Wake, as well as the Research Triangle generally, all saw an upswing in support to the Democratic Senate candidate. The reason is not only because the efforts of the national Democratic Party boosted turnout, but also because Burr did much better with moderate voters than Tillis, and the urban counties in NC are full of them.

One urban county that lagged behind the others in terms of improved Democratic support: Cumberland. Hagan still did much better than Marshall there, but the swing compared to the other urban counties wasn’t as big. My guess is that Cumberland is less elastic, with fewer of those suburban moderates. Another area that deserves mention is the string of dark blue counties in Eastern NC, from Craven to Dare, along the coast. I’m not sure what happened there.

On the other end of the spectrum, Hagan actually did worse than Marshall in nine counties. Those are, with the biggest swing to the GOP first: Clay, Alexander, Cherokee, Graham, Wilkes, Richmond, Lincoln, Yancey, and Bladen. The most important of these is Lincoln, an exurban Charlotte county with a population of about 80,000. It’s probably not a coincidence that it borders Tillis’ home in North Mecklenburg.

The improved GOP performance in Clay, Cherokee, and Graham are explainable by their presence in the Chattanooga media market. In Clay, Tillis improved on Burr’s margin of victory by 6.87%. If he had somehow managed to replicate that in the rest of the state, Tillis would have won in a 19-point landslide. The other counties with improved GOP performance are less easily explainable, but probably has something to do with local factors in either 2010 or 2014 which resulted in improved turnout for one party or the other.

That’s a wrap. It’s possible there is an error or two on the map, so if there’s anything that looks “odd”, drop a line and let me know. And any local insights which could explain the peculiarities in the map would be appreciated.

John Wynne

John Wynne is the “conservative voice” at PoliticsNC, where he also provides polling analysis and commentary on legislative campaigns. When not writing about politics, he enjoys gardening and listening to opera. Contact: johncwynne@gmail.com.