Altoona, Pennsylvania is a city in Blair County with a population of around 46,000 people. It is the county seat and has a long history of local politics. The city has an elected mayor and seven council members who serve four-year terms. The Altoona City Council meets regularly to debate and discuss issues facing the community. In addition, the city elects representatives to the Blair County Board of Commissioners, with their main focus being on maintaining services for residents as well as managing county resources. There are also several state representatives from Altoona who serve in both the Pennsylvania House of Representatives and Senate, representing the interests of constituency at a larger level. In general, citizens of Altoona are passionate about engaging in local politics; they are usually willing to discuss any political issues that may arise at any time.
The political climate in Altoona, PA is moderately conservative.
Blair County, PA is very conservative. In Blair County, PA 27.7% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 71.1% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.3% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Blair county remained overwhelmingly Republican, 71.1% to 27.7%.
Blair county voted Republican in every Presidential election since 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Altoona, PA is moderately conservative.
Blair County, Pennsylvania is very conservative.
Altoona Metro Area is very conservative.
Pennsylvania is leaning liberal.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index is based on recent voting in national elections, federal campaign contributions by local residents, and consumer personality profiles.
VoteWord™
Displaying 20 years of Presidential voting, visualized in one word.
Altoona, Pennsylvania: R R R R R R
How It Works:
Here at BestPlaces, we were looking at the voting patterns since the 2000 election and realized that we could express the results of each election as one letter. R if the Republican Party candidate won, D if the Democratic Party candidate won and I if the Independent Party candidate won. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D R R).
Then we went a little further and added the dimension of magnitude. If the difference of victory was greater than 10 percent, the letter is upper case, and lower case if the difference was less than 10 percent. This allows us to see interesting voting patterns at just a glance.
Here's the VoteWord for Iowa d r d d r. In the last six elections the state has been closely contested, voting narrowly for the Republican Party candidate in 2016 and 2020 after voting for the Democratic Party in 2008 and 2012. Virginia (r r d d d D) has voted for the Democratic Party in the last three elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in Altoona, PA
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 360 contributions totaling $17,528 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $49 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 532 contributions totaling $334,654 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $629 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)