LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) – The South is stepping into the spotlight in the 2016 presidential campaign.
The region once was a Democratic stronghold but today is a Republican bulwark – the result of decades-old shifts in the national parties that accelerated under President Barack Obama.
Democrats now control just one governor’s mansion, one Senate seat and no legislative chambers from the Carolinas westward to Texas.
That’s left the South a starker, more sharply divided microcosm of the demographic dynamics at play across the country.
Republican presidential candidates are fighting for support from a mostly white electorate, including many voters who feel alienated by sweeping economic and cultural changes.
Democrats will be dependent on growing minority populations and voters clustered in heavily populated urban areas.