I’ve been trying to tell folks, the rust belt thing is bigger than than just Trump. This is a major realignment that has been long overdue!!! Of working class, and white working class in particular. They should have moved R long ago, but idiotic adherence to “free trade” kept it from starting...
Trump is a catalyst, he abandoned this nonsense and provided the R don’t blow it, the rust belt could be as reliably red as the south within a few cycles....
MN is a bit of an odd beast, I don’t know if it could ever go solid red, but the rest sans MN and IL certainly can, and should if R’s aren’t too stupid and squander it.
I moved from Chicago to Georgia in 1968 and watched the whole South turn GOP. I remember Newt winning his west GA District in 1978. Then the Reagan Dems in 1980. Decades later in 2002 GA elected its first GOP Governor in 130 years. Now every state office in GA is held by the GOP.
It may take decades but the Rust Belt could turn red.