This is Florida but I’m sure it’s the same in Iowa, Texas, Ohio, and California. Boomers are selling their homes and planning retirement. There is a natural rightward movement as we age but Trump? This is the Woodstock Generation, veterans of 'Nam, Cold Warriors. Why Trump, the ultimate RWNJ. Underline Nut.
This from Tampa Bay Times: www.tampabay.com/…
For several consecutive years, The Villages has been the fastest-growing metropolitan area in the United States, drawing retirees to an area northwest of Orlando with endless recreation, relative affordability and an almost jarring level of cleanliness and order. Now more than 124,000 people live in the metro area.
The Villages proper has soared from 8,300 residents in 2000 to more than 66,000 today, with a median age of 67. There are two Republicans for every Democrat.
The storyline is well known and regularly draws wide-eyed news media reports laced with Viagra and “Disney for Adults” references.
Yet over time, the explosive growth has fueled a remarkable, somewhat under-the-radar demographic trend that is playing an increasingly key role in the country’s most prized swing state.
Overwhelmingly white and Republican, The Villages and surrounding areas have offset the rise in Hispanic residents in Central Florida, part of the vaunted I-4 corridor where elections are decided. In a state with a history of bitterly close elections, small shifts matter greatly and this one played a key role in Donald Trump’s narrow victory.
“He’s a real person, not a politician,” said 72-year-old Terry, a former home builder in Illinois who moved here in 2011. “I started a business, worked hard and made something out of it.”
They believe in MAGA. Now, 99% of them are on Medicare and receive SS, yet when GOP candidates visit and say “we must cut Medicare” they all stand-up and cheer. WTF? “We must cut SS”, more cheers. ?? Overwhelmingly white must have a lot to do with it.
John and Anna, in their early 70s, came in 2009 from Democratic stronghold California, where they ran a print shop and didn’t pay much attention to politics. They bought their home here sight unseen, convinced by friends who had already moved.
“Now we’re definitely Republicans,” Mrs. H said from their cart parked near Panera Bread. She said she didn’t like Clinton, especially after the comment about some Trump supporters being “deplorables” — a label some in The Villages embraced as they covered their carts with campaign signs and paraded through the streets.
“Hopefully the Democrats have learned we’re not dumb people,” said Edie Miller, 68, who moved from Pittsburgh six years ago with her husband Dan, a former electric company worker. They sat on a bench in a town square as a man with a guitar played country songs to a small crowd. A few people danced.
Across the square, every seat was filled at an outdoor bar, where gin and tonics go for $2.75 all day. Everyone was white (98 percent of the population is) except for one black man, who said he lives outside the Villages but likes to frequent, though he doesn’t share the politics.
Democrats live here but maintain a lower profile, outnumbered 2-to-1, more so if right-leaning independents are counted. After Clinton’s loss, Democrats nationally bemoaned their sliding grip on the kind of white voters flocking to The Villages.
But the GOP faces its own issues for relying so heavily on white voters in a diversifying country and a state like Florida.
“The Republican Party is becoming an all-white party, unfortunately,” said GOP strategist Mark Zubaly of Tallahassee. “We need to wake up to that,” he added. “Eventually the rush of baby boomers from the north will end.”
I am a Boomer and rushed to FL but I remain Blue.