Democrats cheered, and some Republicans were shocked, at the results of a recent special election in Texas: Democrat Taylor Rehmet defeated Leigh Wambsganss, flipping a reliably red Senate district. This, some social media posts predicted, meant a boost for the left. But CNN’s data man, Harry Enten, says Dems shouldn’t get too comfortable. He suggested that a blue state depression may be in the cards for the left side of the aisle.
Appearing on a Feb. 1 CNN Newsroom episode, Enten said, “[I]n politics, we often lose sight of the long term because we’re … so focused in on the short term, so today I wanted to take a look at some long-term population trends.” And these trends, he warned, “really should set off a flashing red siren to Democrats nationwide, while bringing a big smile to the faces of Republicans nationwide.”
Population Driving the Blue State Depression
The US Census Bureau released a report late last month showing the nation’s moving trends. As Enten pointed out, the five states that had the biggest population gains since the 2020 Census all voted for President Donald Trump in 2024. They are: Arizona, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Texas. Furthermore, the five states with the “lowest domestic net migration this decade” were those that voted for Kamala Harris: California, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, and Massachusetts. Enten said this “is not just a red state boom,” but “we’re also looking at what I would dare call a blue state depression.”
Why does this matter? House seats are reapportioned based on state population, so if the current trend holds for the 2030 Census in the states where Harris won, the Democratic Party could lose up to seven seats in the House, and the states Trump won would gain seven.
This impacts presidential elections as well. Currently, a candidate needs 270 electoral votes to get elected. But Enten said if you use the 2025 numbers, “the population estimates to the Electoral College, the blue states, plus the ‘blue wall’ of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin would no longer be enough.” For example, if Harris had been able to win the baseline Democratic states and the blue wall, she would have received 270 electoral votes. But “if you apply the 2025 estimates … [y]ou would only get to 263 electoral votes if you were a Democrat, which would mean a Republican victory,” Enten pointed out.
The Feet Are Talking
America’s population grew slowly in 2025, mostly because of immigration control at the border. The country added 10.3 million people since 2020, bringing the total to 341.8 million, according to the Census Bureau. A fifth of those additions came from births over deaths, and the rest were new arrivals. As the National Review noted, “The low rate of births, by itself, is deeply concerning; the notion of a future in which we add four new immigrants for every net increase of one homegrown American is alarming.”
When it comes to international migrations, the numbers increased during the Biden administration from 1.7 million in 2022 to 2.2 million in 2023 and 2.7 million in 2024. But last year, that number dropped to just 1.3 million, and the foreign-born population went from 53.3 million to 51.9 million between January and June in 2025.
The National Review broke down the numbers, noting, “No wonder projections for the post-2030 reapportionment now show a nine-seat loss for states that were won by Kamala Harris in 2024, with eleven new House seats and electoral votes for red states being offset only by losses of a seat apiece for narrowly divided Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. That is a grim picture for Democrats indeed. Texas is now projected to gain four seats, Florida two, and California to lose four.”
While the blue states added more people at a higher per capita rate, they lost 478,319 people to internal migration, at an average of 3,377 per million. The red states gained 399,121 people, an average of 2,683 per million. And then there are the purple states, those that voted for Biden in 2020 and swung to Trump in 2024. These states are Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. The purple states gained 79,198, an average of 1,542 per million. So, from 2020 to 2025, the red states gained 3.3 million from internal migration, the purple states gained 500,000, and the blue states lost 3.8 million.
Now let’s talk about illegal immigration and its impact on the population. During Biden’s four years in office, both blue and red states gained around three million people from international migration, and purple states gained 740,325. Enter President Donald Trump. Between 2024 and 2025, blue states dropped at a per capita rate of 5,392 per million, red states lost 3,738 per million, and purple states lost 2,970. “The blue-state model simply doesn’t work for its citizens. That’s why they keep leaving, and why those states need to keep importing noncitizens by hook or by crook to replace them,” National Review observed.
People are leaving Democrat-run states for several reasons, such as higher cost of living, taxes, and politics. Strict immigration policies have drastically reduced the number of illegals coming into the country. Elections can flip on turnout, messaging, or a single bad candidate, but population shifts are slower, quieter, and far more unforgiving. If blue states continue to bleed residents while red and purple states gain political weight, we may just see a blue state depression in our nation.
