It can get pretty lonely being a Republican in Massachusetts. Just ask Jack Barron, chairman of the Republican Committee of Southborough, who works to increase local interest in the GOP.
"We have a very intolerant left in Massachusetts,” said Barron. “The Democrats and the Socialist Communists are very intolerant of people who don't vote the way they do or think the way they do.”
Barron said his car was vandalized after he placed a sticker on it showing support for Republicans. And Barron lives in one of the reddest areas in the state.
President Donald Trump won more cities and towns in Worcester County than he did in any other Massachusetts county in 2016. And over the past 20 years, voters there have shown increasing support for the Republican presidential ticket, according to data from the Massachusetts Secretary of State. If you look at a map of reliably blue Massachusetts, there's a band of red in the center of the state.
Six of Worcester County’s 60cities and towns supported the 2000 Bush/Cheney Republican ticket. In 2004 The number of communities voting Republican doubled, to 12, and that number shot up to 33 communities, when President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence ran in 2016.
Jim Polito, a conservative political commentator on radio station WTAG in Worcester, said there is “a little bit of a Republican revolution” taking place in Worcester County.
“I won't be surprised on election night, like I wasn't in 2016, when a significant number of people from central Massachusetts vote Trump because they're either blue collar Democrats or they're Republicans,” he said.
Unenrolled voters make up the bulk of the Massachusetts electorate, according to Massachusetts voter enrollment, though Democrats are most often elected to offices statewide and nationally.
That can make it hard for a Republican in the State House, said State Rep. Joseph McKenna, a GOP party member from Webster, also in Worcester County. McKenna is among the most conservative Republicans in the State House, but he said he’s also a pragmatist.
“We're in Massachusetts, after all, and despite the fact that my district is maybe the second or third most conservative district in the state, I still need to get along with a supermajority Democrat Party that runs the legislature,” he said.
Republican State Representative Hannah Kane, from Shrewsbury, has been a Republican since she first started voting. Kane said voters look for a candidate who cares about the things they do. And in Worcester County more than most places, voters are opting for Republicans.
She said the voters think to themselves, “Where do I find more commonality? Where do I feel more comfortable that this person running represents my interests or the way that I view the world than the other person does?”
Anthony Dell'Aera, Worcester State University assistant professor of political science, took a shot at answering why Worcester County is relatively so red.
“I think Worcester County has a fairly strong Republican presence because the character of many of the places in Worcester, outside of the city itself, are more rural,” he said. “I also think people in these locations, they tend to feel more of a disconnect from the more urban culture that you might see in [the city of] Worcester and certainly in Boston or the metro west area.”
Dell'Aera said despite division right now between Trump Republicans and Baker Republicans in the Massachusetts Republican Party, support in Worcester County for the GOP will likely hold steady in 2020.
