Grass Valley, CA is a small city in California's Gold Country with a population of around 12,500 residents. Politically, the city leans slightly to the left and is represented by Democrat Congressman John Garamendi in the U.S. House of Representatives. On the local level, Grass Valley has a five-member City Council that serves as its legislative body, with Mayor Lisa Swarthout being the current leader. The council is responsible for setting policies for the city and making decisions on issues such as economic development and public safety. The city also operates under a mayor-council form of government in which all departments are supervised by the mayor and council members serve as both policy makers and department heads. The City Council also works in partnership with many other agencies throughout Nevada County to promote economic development and provide services to residents of Grass Valley and surrounding communities.
The political climate in Grass Valley, CA is somewhat liberal.
Nevada County, CA is somewhat liberal. In Nevada County, CA 55.8% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 41.1% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 3.2% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Nevada county remained strongly Democratic, 55.8% to 41.1%.
Nevada county voted Democratic in 2020, 2016 and 2008, and voted Republican in 2012, 2004 and 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Grass Valley, CA is somewhat liberal.
Nevada County, California is somewhat liberal.
Truckee-Grass Valley Metro Area is somewhat liberal.
California is strongly 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.
Grass Valley, California: R r d r 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 Grass Valley, CA
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 13,541 contributions totaling $951,526 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $70 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 1,426 contributions totaling $206,210 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $145 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)