By Jay Weiner

Analysis

You’re reading the Park Bugle but live in the Park Bubble.

In the aftermath of Donald Trump’s victory over Kamala Harris in the United States’ presidential election, an almost unanimous funk blanketed our neighborhoods, from St. Anthony Park to Lauderdale, from Falcon Heights to Como Park.  

A data dive into the Bugle circulation area’s election results reveals some things, perhaps obvious but worthy of reminder.

First, we are nearly unanimous in our voting choices compared to the rest of Minnesota.

Second, our hyperlocal numbers demonstrate how symptomatic we are of the insulated state and national electorates.

Eleven precincts comprise the Bugle’s readership area: eight in St. Paul’s St. Anthony Park and the Como Park areas, two in Falcon Heights and one in Lauderdale. These make up most of State Legislative District 66A.

Here’s how our bubble exists in the larger universe:

Nationally, Trump won the popular vote by about 3 million and  percentage points, 50.3 percent to 48 percent. He won 30 states to Harris’s 20.

Statewide in Minnesota, Harris won by 138,000 votes, 51 percent to Trump’s 47. But she won in only nine of the state’s 87 counties, indicating that her victory in Minnesota was due to a handful of bubbles like ours. Seventy-eight different kinds of bubbles went for Trump.

Harris’s percentage in our Ramsey County was the largest—70.2 percent—of any county in the Minnesota, even larger than Hennepin, home to Minneapolis.

A local look

On to our local bubble, State District 66A. Harris won 18,470 to 3,754, or 81 percent to 16 percent of votes cast.

That means we were in the top nine most Harris-supporting districts statewide. Only eight others among the state’s 134 districts exceeded us, including St. Paul’s Merriam Park and Macalester-Groveland neighborhoods and a cluster in south Minneapolis.

Finally, to our collection of micro-bubbles. north St. Anthony Park’s Ward 4, Precinct 1, the Luther Seminary polling location, saw 91.5 percent vote for Harris over Trump.

In Precinct 2, the Langford Park precinct, Harris garnered 87.4 percent of the vote.

Moving to the Como Park neighborhoods, Harris also topped 80 percent, with Trump’s support never exceeding 9 percent. Lauderdale was the most Trump-leaning, with 18 percent of the vote for him versus Harris’s 78 percent.

Margins aside, we were part of a troubling statewide voting statistic. While Harris outperformed Biden’s 66A result from 2020 by one-half of a percentage point, turnout this year was lower across the Bugle area and by nearly 3 percent in the Harris-heavy Seminary polling place.

Across Minnesota, voter turnout was down almost 4 percent. The “existential threat to democracy” on the ballot didn’t motivate all our neighbors.

In the end, these numbers might not seem all that surprising. And, for most of us, there’s pride, not regret, in voting for Harris.

Pundits have asserted many things about the election’s outcome. Developing a persuasive call to action will be for others. This is just a numerical gaze into the Bugle area’s mirror.

What’s reflected is simply who we are. Over our shoulders are the many other, different bubbles staring back at us.

Jay Weiner is a St. Anthony Park resident and veteran journalist and writing consultant.

BUBBLE GRAPHIC

Our voting ‘bubbles’

• Nation: Trump 50.3%, Harris 48%
• Minnesota: Harris 51%, Trump 47%
• Legislative District 66A: Harris 81%, Trump 16%
• St. Paul Ward 4, Precinct 1: Harris 91.5%, Trump 6%