West Virginia was once a Democratic stronghold. But in the past decade, the state has grown increasingly red.
Between December 2016 and October 2024, Democratic Party enrollment in West Virginia fell by more than 37 percent, according to voter registration data from the secretary of state’s office.
Today, Republicans in the Mountain State outnumber Democrats by more than 100,000. Residents have different ideas of what caused that decline.
Brady Boccucci, an early voter from Martinsburg, thinks it has something to do with the years-long decrease in union membership, since unions long received support from the Democratic Party.
“I think the decline of unionization in West Virginia has led towards more people registering Republican,” Boccucci said.
In the early 1980s, about one in five American workers was backed by a union, according to the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics. Today, that figure sits closer to one in ten.
Janel Clement of Hedgesville, Berkeley County, was registered as a Republican earlier in life. But today she is a registered Democrat, and said that political messaging from the party of her youth has pushed her away from voting for candidates on the right.
“This party today bears no resemblance to the Republican Party of my youth,” she said.
The West Virginia Democratic Party and its chair, Del. Mike Pushkin, D-Kanawha, did not respond to multiple phone call and email requests for comment on this story.
Between 2016 and 2024, Republican party registration has also increased by roughly 25 percent. And since 2023, ten additional West Virginia counties flipped from blue to red, with Republican registration now leading in 47 counties total.
Frank DiStefano of Charles Town said this could be because Republicans like him feel alienated by the Democratic Party’s messaging.
“The situation is so bad now,” he said. “When you start bullying one team and calling them Hitler and calling them all kinds of – that's not helping me.”
Other political groups, like the Libertarian and Mountain parties, have also seen modest gains. Jessica Geiermann of Shepherdstown said that partisan politics can push moderate voters away from major-party affiliation.
“I'm a registered libertarian. I think it's because sometimes, with our bipartisan [system] not everybody fits into one mold,” she said. “So I think some of the third parties might be becoming more appealing to people.”
Political leaders in the state’s Republican Party are excited by these trends. Chairman Matt Herridge said they suggest that his party reflects the values of the state better than the Democratic party.
“I think that a lot of West Virginians have always, whether Democrat or Republican, hold those values of faith, family and freedom, and they just feel that their party has left them,” Herridge said.
Beyond just messaging, Herridge said efforts to transition away from coal, an industry with a historically major presence in the state, lost long-time loyalty to the Democratic Party in West Virginia.
Herridge noted that changes in affiliation haven’t been uniform across the state’s landscape. He said upticks in Republican registration have been more pronounced in rural areas, and that several urban areas in the state still lean blue.
But he thinks current trends suggest more West Virginia voters might begin to identify with his party’s mission.
“It is on us, I think, to try to be as big tent as we can,” Herridge said. “Certainly we’re getting more and more optimistic as we get closer to Nov. 5.”