新闻 不难理解为什么共和党人无法想象特朗普联盟会瓦解。MAGA选举版图最早在2016年构建，此后八年、五场选举基本保持原样。农村地区依然偏红，或者变得更红。非白人、工人阶级地区逐渐远离民主党。新政联盟的政党被压缩成城市和郊区的群岛，在红色版图上留下蓝色斑点，总统喜欢向白宫访客展示这张地图。
The News It’s easy to understand why Republicans couldn’t imagine the Trump coalition cracking. The MAGA electoral map, first built in 2016, stayed mostly intact for eight years and five elections. Rural areas stayed red or got redder. Non-white, working class areas drifted away from Democrats. The party of the New Deal was reduced to an urban and suburban archipelago, blue smudges on a red map that the president liked to show off to White House visitors.
美国计票缓慢的一个好处是，在大新闻尘埃落定后，会浮现出更有趣的图景。上周我们已经知道特朗普联盟解体了，现在我们又了解到，民主党以14个百分点的优势赢下全国，这是众议院选举的平均得票率。
One good thing about America’s languid vote count is that a more interesting picture fills in after the big story is over. We knew last week that the Trump coalition came apart, and we’re learning now that Democrats won the country by 14 points, in the average House vote.
周二之前，共和党人无法想象这种转变。显然，当他们在深红州听从总统、重新划分国会选区地图时，并没有为此做打算。他们原本预计特朗普联盟至少还能维持十年：美国农村牢牢锁定，美国郊区仍有竞争力，非白人选民与“觉醒”反对党疏远。
Republicans couldn’t imagine that shift before Tuesday. Obviously, they didn’t plan for it when they heeded the president, in deep red states, and re-drew congressional maps. They planned for at least another decade of the Trump coalition, with rural America locked up, suburban America still competitive, and non-white voters alienated from the “woke” opposition party.
杰利蝾螈的傲慢 今年北卡罗来纳的故事是共和党杰利蝾螈的破碎——七个席位在2024年以两位数优势支持特朗普，随后却选出了民主党人。印第安纳、南卡罗来纳和犹他的故事则是，共和党人试图重新划分地图，失败了，并因此免于选举灾难。如果共和党人建成了他们想要的选区，这三个州中的大多数选区本会投票给民主党。
Gerrymander hubris The story of North Carolina this year is the shattered GOP gerrymander — seven seats that backed Trump by double digits in 2024, then elected Democrats. The stories in Indiana, South Carolina, and Utah are that Republicans tried to re-draw their maps, failed, and were saved from electoral disaster. Had Republicans built the districts they wanted, most of them, across those three states, would have voted for Democrats.
共和党人为何如此傲慢自大？仔细看看2016年到上周发生的事情。特朗普的选举版图是两党几代人以来构建的最稳固的版图。它让中西部上游地区保持竞争态势，这是乔治·W·布什未能做到的。它让阿巴拉契亚地区对民主党人几乎成为不可涉足之地，这是罗纳德·里根未能做到的。理查德·尼克松未能凭借自身声势带动共和党国会。特朗普做到了好几次——2016年和2024年拿下两院，2018年拿下参议院，2022年拿下众议院。
Why were Republicans so hubristic? Look closely at what happened from 2016 to last week. The Trump electoral map was the most solid either party had built in generations. It kept the upper Midwest competitive, which George W. Bush hadn’t been able to do. It made Appalachia nearly uninhabitable for Democrats, which Ronald Reagan couldn’t do. Richard Nixon couldn’t carry a GOP Congress on his coattails. Trump did several times — both chambers in 2016 and 2024, the Senate in 2018, the House in 2022.
每个政治联盟最终都会瓦解，除非你经营的是日本自民党之类的组织。巴拉克·奥巴马2008年的胜利让民主党人做起了头晕目眩的白日梦，以为形成了“永久性”多数，共和党只能暂时将其击败。2013年，在民主党凭借少数白人选民但绝大多数非白人选民赢得第二次总统选举后，罗恩·布朗斯坦写道：“奥巴马不再需要偏右的白人选民了。”
Every political coalition falls apart eventually, unless you’re running the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan or something. Barack Obama’s 2008 win led Democrats into some dizzy daydreams about a “permanent” majority that Republicans could only temporarily defeat. “Obama doesn’t need right-leaning whites anymore,” Ron Brownstein wrote in 2013, after Democrats won a second presidential election with a minority of white voters but a supermajority of non-whites.
很长一段时间里，两党都在想，特朗普是否建立了比那更坚固的东西。他并不指望人口结构变化来维持共和党执政。他抛弃了共和党对福利改革的承诺，这疏远了工人阶级选民；也抛弃了共和党对自由贸易的支持，而当这些选民对自己的文化观点感到不安时，自由贸易曾是民主党最有力的论据之一。他不仅做到了，而且像他那样竞选的共和党人也得以保住这些成果。
For a long time, both parties wondered if Trump had built something sturdier than that. He wasn’t counting on demographic change to keep Republicans in power. He’d ditched the GOP’s commitment to entitlement reform, which alienated working class voters, and its support for free trade, which was one of the Democrats’ best arguments when those voters got queasy about their cultural views. Not only did he do it, but Republicans who campaigned like him were able to keep those gains.
2016年，特朗普拿下了206个曾两次支持巴拉克·奥巴马的县。民主党人认为这只是偶然，认为更加民粹主义的政治能够把这些选民赢回来——他们没有问“如果我们拆分大银行，就能终结种族主义吗？”2020年，他们开展竞选活动时，仿佛东艾奥瓦、俄亥俄东北部和宾夕法尼亚东南部的选民已经把反建制选票发泄完了，可以再次被争取过来。
In 2016, Trump carried 206 counties that had supported Barack Obama twice. Democrats believed this was a fluke, that more populist politics could win them back — not asking “if we broke up the big banks, would that end racism?”In 2020 they campaigned like eastern Iowa, northeast Ohio, and southeast Pennsylvania had gotten their anti-establishment votes out of their system and could be won again.
但2024年特朗普夺回白宫时，他拿下了其中181个县。几乎每一位共和党人都走着同一张地图。共和党灾难性的中期选举策略，建立在这样一种假设之上：选民在2016年之后已经习惯了支持共和党，并在迈克·约翰逊说“这不是你祖父那一代的民主党”时点头认同——他总是说“Democrat”，从不说“Democratic”。民主党变了，共和党没有为民主党的变化做好准备，也没有向这些选民提出文化上不那么左翼的方案。
But when he won back the White House in 2024, Trump carried 181 of those counties. And nearly every Republican walked the same map. The GOP’s disastrous midterm strategy was premised on voters who had become comfortable supporting Republicans after 2016 and nodded when Mike Johnson said “this isn’t your grandfather’s Democrat Party” — always “Democrat,” never “Democratic.”Democrats changed Republicans didn’t plan for Democrats to change, and offer a less culturally left-wing package to these voters.
在全国大部分地区，民主党人得以重新介绍自己，并切割特朗普的地图。里奥格兰德河谷和南佛罗里达对共和党人来说是灾难，他们把拉丁裔选民当作MAGA运动的新成员，而不是把他们当作他们本来的摇摆选民。但与农村白人选民的支持率下滑，在全国更多地区造成了更大的损害。共和党的杰利蝾螈遵循一个简单的公式：分割民主党城市，用农村选民将其淹没。
In much of the country, Democrats were able to reintroduce themselves and slice up the Trump map. The Rio Grande Valley and South Florida were disasters for Republicans, who treated Latino voters like new members of the MAGA movement, not as the swing voters they are. But the drop-off with rural white voters was more damaging in more of the country. Republican gerrymandering followed a simple formula: Carve up Democratic cities and overwhelm them with rural voters.
这套做法之所以奏效，是因为他们很清楚那些农村选民有多共和党。它之所以失效，是因为民主党争取到了其中如此多的选民。
This worked because they had a good idea of how Republican those rural voters were. It stopped working because Democrats competed for so many of them.
这解释了北卡罗来纳州的惨败：在那里，47%的白人选民支持了当选参议员罗伊·库珀，而共和党人在下游选票上在这些选民中的表现历来糟糕。众议员蒂姆·摩尔曾帮助绘制该州的杰利蝾螈选区划分，他给自己安排了一个席位，在那里，自由派的梅克伦堡县选民人数被西部的农村保守派超过。拉凯莎·沃马克击败了他，她在梅克伦堡将民主党的优势翻倍，并在其他地方以较小的差距落败，将他在农村县的差距缩小了15到20个百分点。
That explains the disaster in North Carolina, where 47% of white voters backed Sen.-elect Roy Cooper, and Republicans did historically poorly with those voters down-ballot. Rep. Tim Moore, who had helped draw the state’s gerrymander, had given himself a seat where liberal Mecklenburg County voters were outnumbered by rural conservatives to the west. Lakesha Womack beat him by doubling the Democratic margin in Mecklenburg and by losing by less elsewhere, cutting his margins in rural counties by 15 to 20 points.
“农村选民不一定都是MAGA选民，”北卡罗来纳州民主党主席安德森·克莱顿上周告诉我。“他们不一定认同共和党政治。只是共和党是唯一一直在与他们沟通、积极努力进入他们的社区并在那里推举候选人的政党。”克莱顿多年来一直试图实现这一改变。许多民主党人也曾尝试，但收效甚微。这让共和党人有了信心：虽然在没有特朗普出现在选票上的情况下，特朗普选民更难被动员，但他们已经排除了支持民主党的可能，并且可以被说服出来保护自己的枪支、孩子和宗教免受民主党侵害。
“Rural voters are not necessarily all the way MAGA voters,” North Carolina Democratic Party chair Anderson Clayton told me last week. “They’re not necessarily bought into Republican politics. It’s just that the Republicans were the only party that’s been communicating to them and aggressively trying to be in their communities, and running candidates in them.”Clayton had been trying to make this change for years. Lots of Democrats had, with little success. This gave Republicans the confidence that, while Trump voters were harder to motivate without him on the ballot, they had ruled out supporting Democrats and could be convinced to come out to protect their guns, kids, and religion from them.
如果事实并非如此，选举版图就不再看起来那么稳固。为抵御民主党+13个百分点的摆动而构建的席位，在+14个百分点的摆动下无法保住。但共和党人相信，特朗普的民族主义和民粹主义正在锁定选民；民主党人则依赖他们杂乱的联盟和旧议题，比如保护社会保障，他们最忠诚的选民正在死去。
If that’s not true, the electoral map stops looking so solid. Seats built to withstand a +13 swing to Democrats couldn’t be saved on a +14 swing. But Republicans believed that Trump’s nationalism and populism were locking in voters; Democrats were relying on their messy coalition and old issues, like protecting Social Security, losing their most loyal voters to the grave.
十年来，这是一个好策略。它比卡尔·罗夫的“永久多数”持续得更久，后者对农村选民吸引力较小，在郊区吸引力较大。但两种选民理论都离不开相信自己的选票是在保护自己生活方式的选民——文化和成本。
It was a good strategy for a decade. It lasted longer than Karl Rove’s “permanent majority,” which was less appealing to rural voters and more appealing in the suburbs. But neither theory of the electorate worked without voters who believed their vote was protecting their way of life – culture and costs.
接下来会怎样？这对选举版图意味着什么？两党明年仍有权重新划分选区。风险评估无疑已经改变。共和党人认识到，如果本党绘制地图来削弱黑人选民的影响力，黑人选民的投票率就会上升，对他们不利，而且白人选民并不会以同样高的投票率来回报他们。
What’s next What implications does this have for the electoral map, which both parties are still empowered to re-draw next year? It’s definitely changed the risk assessment. Republicans learned that black voter turnout will increase, against them, if their party draws maps to reduce their power — and that they don’t get a commensurate thank-you turnout from white voters.
这很可能让他们在密西西比州失去一个参议院席位，在路易斯安那州险些再失一席，还几乎阻断了玛莎·布莱克本通往田纳西州州长官邸的宽阔道路。共和党人明年将无权重新划分佐治亚州的地图，但他们上周醒来时意识到，如果当时有权这样做，他们可能会在亚特兰大郊区失去更多席位。
That will probably cost them a Senate seat in Mississippi, nearly cost them another in Louisiana, and almost blocked Marsha Blackburn’s wide path to the governor’s mansion in Tennessee. Republicans won’t have the power to re-draw Georgia’s maps next year, but they woke up last week realizing that if they had, they might have lost more seats in the Atlanta exurbs.
全国其他地区看起来也更加不确定。多年前，帕特·布坎南告诉我（我猜想他也告诉了每一个和他交谈的人），如果中西部的白人选民开始像南方白人选民那样投票，共和党人就会赢得每一场选举。特朗普证明了布坎南是对的，而当共和党人掌控选区重划后，他们最大化了这个新联盟的力量。这是他们第一次不确定这个联盟是否会再次凝聚起来。这对两党在周二之前就在准备的版图之争有着巨大影响。而这也是每一个永久多数最终都会经历的事。
The rest of the country looks dicier, too. Years ago, Pat Buchanan told me (and I presume everyone he talked to) that if white voters in the Midwest began voting like they did in the South, Republicans would win every election. Trump showed that Buchanan was right, and when they got control of redistricting, Republicans maximized the strength of that new coalition. For the first time, they are not sure that the coalition will come together again. That has enormous implications for the map war that both parties were suiting up for, before Tuesday. And it’s what happens to every permanent majority eventually.
值得关注 在一份关于2028年初选的新备忘录中，中间派民主党团体“欢迎”强调了在MAGA联盟衰落后，初选选民群体如今可能有多么庞大和温和。
Notable In a new memo about the 2028 primary, the centrist Democratic group Welcome emphasizes how large and moderate a primary electorate might be now, after the MAGA coalition’s decline.
在《费耶特维尔观察家报》上，迈伦·B·皮茨仔细审视了在北卡罗来纳州落败的共和党傲慢。为萨巴托的《水晶球》撰稿的路易斯·雅各布森研究了民主党人在下游选战中的表现，以及这对绘制选区地图意味着什么。
In the Fayetteville Observer, Myron B. Pitts looks closely at the Republican hubris that lost in North Carolina. For Sabato’s Crystal Ball, Louis Jacobson studies how well Democrats did in down-ballot races, and what it means for map-making.
为萨巴托的《水晶球》撰稿的路易斯·雅各布森研究了民主党人在下游选战中的表现，以及这对绘制选区地图意味着什么。
For Sabato’s Crystal Ball, Louis Jacobson studies how well Democrats did in down-ballot races, and what it means for map-making.