It turns out the conventional wisdom is right: Massachusetts and Maryland rank as the nation’s most Democratic states, while the most Republican states are Wyoming and Utah.
A Gallup Poll released Wednesday as part of its “State of the States” series found few surprises in its list of the most Democratic and most Republican states, based on political party affiliation as well as voters’ leanings measured by daily tracking polls in 2014.
Eight of the top 10 most Democratic states were in New England and the Mid-Atlantic states, while the Republican states were divided between the Rocky Mountain West, the South and the western Plains.
The top 10 most Democratic states are, in order: Massachusetts, Maryland, Rhode Island, New York, Vermont, California, Hawaii, Delaware, Illinois and a tie between Connecticut and New Jersey.
The top 10 most Republican states are: Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, South Dakota, Montana, Alabama, Kansas, Tennessee, North Dakota and Nebraska.
The most competitive states were Louisiana, Nevada and Ohio, which had a difference of less than a percentage point between the two parties.
Nationally, the Democrats held a slim 3 percentage point edge, but where Republicans dominate, they really dominate: Both Wyoming and Utah had GOP advantages of more than 30 percentage points. No Democratic state had an edge of more than the 21.8 percentage points registered by Massachusetts.
There were also red flags for both parties. The Democratic Party has seen its numbers erode, but Democrats have also managed to hold onto majorities in the most highly populated states, including California, New York and Illinois, which gives the party a significant boost in presidential races.
“The GOP’s inability to dominate in many high-population, electoral vote-rich states underscores the challenges it faces in presidential elections based on the winner-take-all electoral vote system,” said the Gallup analysis. “The GOP can overcome that deficit with better turnout to some degree, but also must carry the vast majority of competitive states in order to win the election.”
The yearlong survey of 177,034 adults 18 and older has a +/- 1 percentage point margin of sampling error and 95 percent confidence level.
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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