An array of Democratic signs in the headquarters of the local Democratic Party in Hobbs, N.M., pictured in mid-September. In the vast 2nd congressional district, just one precinct has voted for the eventual CD2 winner each time since 2014, after this week’s election result. (Photo by Patrick Lohmann / Source NM)
Heading into the 2024 General Election, three precincts across the vast 2nd Congressional District had the unusual distinction of voting for the eventual winner of the hotly contested seat every election for the last decade.
Now that the dust has settled and a winner declared, only one such precinct remains: Valencia County’s Precinct 39, which went for Rep. Gabe Vasquez, a Democrat who was reelected this week.
Of 548 precincts that stayed in CD2 through redistricting in 2021, three of them voted for the winning candidate in each election since 2014. They did so even though CD2 has flipped parties four times in the last five elections.
Since 2014, CD2 has gone from Republican Steve Pearce, who was re-elected in 2016, to Democrat Xochitl Torres-Small in 2018, to Republican Yvette Herrell in 2020, to Vasquez, the Democrat elected in 2022 and this year.
Source New Mexico published a story last week about the history and political attitudes of one such “bellwether” precinct, which was Lea County’s Precinct 53. According to Secretary of State unofficial election returns, Precinct 53 voted for Herrell by a tiny margin: 139 to 137.
Herrell’s victory was unexpected, given the precinct’s political composition after redistricting. Redistricting cut out the rural area in Precinct 53 outside the Hobbs city limits, excising 33 square miles of the precinct and removing 300 registered voters.
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The precinct’s political makeup went from 36% Democrat and 29% Republican in January 2021 to 41% Democrat and 22% Republican in January 2022, which was after redistricting went into effect.
Socorro County’s Precinct 24, another “bellwether,” went for Herrell, as well, after she got 113 votes compared with Vasquez’s 100.
Valencia’s Precinct 39 had much higher turnout than the other two “bellwethers,” where 464 voters went for Vasquez compared to 388 who went for Herrell.
Valencia County as a whole is a nationally recognized “bellwether” county, though it voted for President Donald Trump in 2020, which ended its streak since at least 1980 of voting alongside the national presidential election winner every year.
Michael Rocca, a political science professor at the University of New Mexico, cautioned that “bellwethers” are not “crystal balls” that can predict winners or contain especially open-minded voters. Instead, “bellwethers” just occur randomly and reflect how competitive races are.
See a map below of how the 548 precincts that have stayed in CD2 for since 2014 voted between 2014 and 2022: