The Atlantic

One Thing About the 2020 Election Is Already Clear

Regardless of which side wins next year, the divide between red and blue America is likely to only grow wider.
Source: Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

The 2020 presidential election remains very much up for grabs, but one thing already seems clear: It will end with about half of America triumphant, and the other half furious and fearful.

Whichever side ultimately prevails in November, red and blue America are diverging along both demographic and geographic lines as sharply as at any other point in modern American history. The biggest lesson of the coming year may be that for all the divisiveness that President Donald Trump has stoked, the political divide may still continue to grow wider.

The 2020 election looms as a “Battle of the Bulge” between a Republican coalition that represents what America has been and a Democratic coalition that embodies what it is becoming. By all indications, is poised to be the highest in decades, in part because so many Americans consider

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