As the extraordinary Oval Office meeting between Donald Trump and Zohran Mamdani shows, there’s a new bellwether in American politics.
For years, Ohio played that role. In every election from 1964 to 2016, the state voted for the winning presidential candidate, and every four years journalists would travel there to interview voters in Columbus and Cincinnati, Dayton and Youngstown. But in 2020 Biden won without carrying the state, and today Ohio is deeply red, costing it its bellwether status. Several other states once considered battlegrounds – Iowa, Missouri, and Florida – have also turned firmly Republican.
But now a new bellwether has emerged: Queens. This humble New York borough contains multitudes. With a population of 2.3 million, it would be the nation’s fifth largest city if it stood alone. And in diversity it is without peer. Nearly half of Queens residents are foreign born. It is about a quarter white, a quarter Latino, nearly a quarter Asian and 17% Black, and 140 languages a
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