Is the GOP the Party of the American West?
By Tom Morel ‘23
The Republican Party has a Western problem. For several decades, the GOP won the Mountain West handily, consistently carrying Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho and often winning Nevada, New Mexico, and Colorado in presidential and senatorial elections. Today, Republican politicians are struggling to hold conservative icon Barry Goldwater’s Senate seat in Arizona, and, according to the Real Clear Politics polling aggregate, President Trump will lose half of the Mountain West states (Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico). If Republicans wish to have any chance of competing in these rapidly growing Western states, they must abandon populist conservatism and welcome Hispanics as a key constituency of a reformed GOP.
Republican leaders’ embrace of social conservatism has alienated them from many Western voters. During the 1980s and 1990s, the GOP allowed Evangelists like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson to dictate the party’s social agenda. In a 1981 Senate floor speech, trailblazing Senator Goldwater denounced the Religious Right as illegitimate conservatives and “political preachers.” Indeed, the Republican Party’s welcoming of the “Moral Majority” weakened its traditional position as a protector of civil liberties, since the evangelist movement opposes basic individual rights like freedom of marriage.
The iconic Arizona senator was right: the efforts by Falwell, Robertson, and their “moralistic” colleagues to “make a religious organization” out of the GOP is antithetical to the libertarian-infused conservatism prominent in the Mountain West. Ultimately, Western Republicans and conservative-leaning voters paid the price as their party tacked right.In fact, religious conservatism continues to cost Republicans electoral wins as the American West leaves the Party of Goldwater in ever-greater numbers. The libertarian and independent Western voter has no home in its former party.
The Republican Party of Trump juxtaposes that of Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan. For instance, the president’s criticism and revision of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is a stark departure from free market capitalism and the free trade consensus embraced by Republicans for decades. NAFTA was the brainchild of Reagan, conceived during his 1980 presidential bid, polished by President George H.W. Bush, and signed by President Bill Clinton in 1993. The rejection of globalism and free enterprise represents a greater shift in Republican politics – an outward dismissal of the principles of limited government that (in part) drove American settlers to Western states over a century ago. The West’s “can do” spirit has allured countless Americans seeking refuge from high taxes, stagnating regulation, and government micro-management of people’s personal lives and decisions. However, President Trump’s protectionist economic and political message contrasts sharply with that Western optimism and puts him out of touch with many voters who prioritize individual liberty and believe that America’s best days are ahead. The Republican Party’s Western problem predates the President, but his repudiation of free trade (and in turn, the free market) and pessimistic outlook on the United States’ future puts the party even farther out of step in the home of Senators John McCain and Pete Domenici.
The Party of Trump has estranged itself from Latinos, a voting bloc critical to the American West and the GOP’s political future. In 2004, President George W. Bush won 44% of the Hispanic vote to Senator John Kerry’s 53% and carried every interior Western state. In 2016, Trump won a paltry 29%, costing him Nevada, New Mexico, and nearly Arizona. By the 2018 midterm elections, Democrats won 69% of Latino voters. The reason for this shift is not difficult to discern. As a candidate, Trump famously accused Mexican immigrants of “bringing drugs”, “crime,” and of being “rapists.” With such consistently hateful and vitriolic rhetoric, the presidential candidate alienated himself and his party from America’s largest ethnic minority, costing Republicans the critical votes they needed to win the Mountain West.
Although it’s hard to imagine in the era of Trump, Republicans once made a real effort to court Latino voters. In a 1984 interview, Senator Paul Laxalt (R-NV) argued that Hispanics “have the (same) values and philosophies” as the GOP and claimed that his party was “too wasp-ish,” costing them significant minority support. Laxalt’s close friend, President Reagan, agreed and granted amnesty in 1986 to three million illegal immigrants who had entered the US before 1982. The Gipper and his vice president won every Western state by double digits in their respective presidential elections from 1980-88. If Republicans hope to control the Mountain West, they must understand that Latinos are an increasingly powerful demographic and extend an olive branch that their current party leader will not.
The American West is fundamentally independent. Its citizens, by and large, are not wed to a stifling political ideology and generally respect individual rights. Nevertheless, the GOP’s shift from libertarianism towards social conservatism and protectionism, as well as its harsh rhetoric toward Hispanic-Americans, has cost them key votes in many Western states (and across the nation as a whole). If Republicans continue along their populist path, they will be left with few supporters and increasingly narrow chances of winning elections. California, the home state of Reagan and Nixon, left the Republican Party over twenty years ago, in large part due to its endorsement of strict anti-immigrant legislation. If Republicans continue to embrace Trumpian rhetoric and his populist positions, the interior West will likely follow suit.