2021年经济学人 特朗普一着不慎,共和党满盘皆输?(2)（在线收听）

Despite its long spell in Republican hands, Georgia has become more competitive because of two demographic trends—a substantial increase in registered non-white voters, who tend to be reliable Democrats if they can be convinced to turn up to the polls, and a shift among educated, suburban whites away from the Republican Party. Both have been driven, among other things, by the economic growth in and around Atlanta.

尽管佐治亚州长期掌握在共和党手中，但由于两大人口趋势，佐治亚州的竞争变得更加激烈。其一是登记在册的非白人选民大幅增加，如果能够说服他们参与投票，他们往往是可靠的民主党人；其二是受过教育的郊区白人逐渐远离共和党。其中，这两大群体的趋势都受到亚特兰大及其周边地区经济增长的推动。

During the presidential election, Mr Biden’s narrow victory was probably based more on a white revolt in the suburbs than on a dramatic surge in the black vote. Despite large increases in registration of black voters, after years of effort by grassroots groups, the black share of the electorate actually dropped between 2016 and 2020. Without defections among whites in Atlanta’s suburbs, Mr Biden might not have won Georgia’s 16 electoral-college votes. The story of the run-off, in contrast, seems to have been higher turnout among black voters, who made up a larger share of the early vote, and mostly voted Democrat.

在总统选举期间，拜登的险胜可能更多地基于郊区白人的翻转，而不是黑人选票的急剧增加。尽管黑人选民的登记人数大幅增加，但经过基层团体多年的努力，2016年至2020年间选民中黑人所占比例实际上有所下降。如果没有亚特兰大郊区白人的翻转，拜登可能不会赢得佐治亚州的16张选举人票。相比之下，参议院竞选时的黑人选民的投票率似乎更高，他们在早期的投票中占了更大的份额，而且大部分都投票支持民主党。

Nse Ufot, the CEO of the New Georgia Project, which seeks to increase turnout among young and non-white voters, credits an organising feat that was years in the making. The group says it has knocked on 2m doors, dispatched 3m text messages and dialled phones 5m times. Ms Ufot notes that there were 120,000 early voters who skipped the presidential election altogether. It may also have helped that neither of the two Democrats was the party’s standard Southern candidate: a milquetoast, carefully calibrated, mildly conservative fellow in soft-bellied middle-age. Mr Warnock is a pastor who preaches in the same church that Martin Luther King Jr once did. Mr Ossoff is a 33-year-old Jewish documentary film-maker. Neither has a genteel twang: Mr Warnock’s cadences are those of a practised sermoniser; Mr Ossoff’s those of a Barack Obama impersonator.

新佐治亚州项目旨在提高年轻人和非白人选民的投票率，其首席执行官恩瑟·乌弗认为，他们经过多年努力才做出了这一组织壮举。新佐治亚州团队表示，他们已经敲开了200万扇门，发送了300万条短信，拨打了500万次电话。乌弗指出，有12万参与参议院竞选早期投票的选民完全没有参加总统选举。这可能会对这两位民主党人有利，毕竟他们都不大符合民主党南方候选人的标准：他们一个胆小慎微、一个是温和保守、大腹便便的中年人。民主党议员沃诺克是一位牧师，他在马丁·路德·金曾经传教过的同一个教堂传教。民主党议员奥索夫是一位33岁的犹太纪录片制片人。两人都没有优雅的鼻音：沃诺克的语调像是一个老练的说教者；奥索夫的语调像是在模仿巴拉克·奥巴马。