Winston-Salem, North Carolina is a city filled with vibrant political life. It is the fifth largest city in the state, and has a wide range of political activities and interests. The major political parties represented in Winston-Salem are the Democratic Party, Republican Party, Libertarian Party, and Green Party. There are also many local non-partisan organizations such as the Winston-Salem based Citizen Action Network that involve citizens in advocacy for policy issues important to their communities. In addition to local elections for City Council and Mayor, Winston-Salem residents regularly participate in state and national elections. The city is known for its large voter turnout during presidential races in particular. Other issues of importance on the ballot vary from year to year depending on the current events of significance to the community at large.
The political climate in Winston-Salem, NC is somewhat liberal.
Forsyth County, NC is somewhat liberal. In Forsyth County, NC 56.2% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 42.3% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.6% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Forsyth county remained strongly Democratic, 56.2% to 42.3%.
Forsyth county voted Democratic in the four most recent Presidential elections, after 2000 and 2004 went Republican.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Winston-Salem, NC is somewhat liberal.
Forsyth County, North Carolina is somewhat liberal.
Winston-Salem Metro Area is somewhat conservative.
North Carolina is leaning conservative.
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.
Winston-Salem, North Carolina: R r D d D D
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 Winston-Salem, NC
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 14,984 contributions totaling $1,599,085 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $107 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 4,739 contributions totaling $2,751,178 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $581 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)