Presidential candidates in 2016 should not underestimate the power of urban identity—it allowed Obama to halve Bush’s urban victories

In 2008, Barack Obama was elected as America’s first urban president, with large victories in the biggest urban centers. What lessons should 2016’s potential candidates be taking from these victories? In new research which examines election results in 92 ‘core’ counties – which accounted for 35 million votes in 2012 – Joshua D. Ambrosius finds that President Obama identified with urban voters in the way that Republicans could not. He argues that this is not likely to change in the near future, as the urban electorate is identifying less and less with the Republican Party, which is doing little to claim cities as their own.