Republicans have largely abandoned the cities. I personally think its a bad thing because we need at least some cities to lean pink if not red.
They’re starting to creep back in in some cities. The GOP has actually been opening some offices in Detroit in recent years.
Cities can be, should be, and sometimes still are great places to live, as well as work. The middle class tends to flee because of crime, taxes, and lousy schools. High taxes and lousy schools are within the control of government, but big cities are fiscally under the control of the unions, while liberal pols systematically resist serious educational reform for an assortment of familiar and bad reasons. Crime is harder because of its links to family breakdown and substance abuse, but it also in large part the long term unintended consequence of Great Society liberalism, which produced a massive expansion of long term dependency.
So is it fair to blame the democrats for the plight of the cities? Yes.
That’s the problem with most cities for the past 50 years+, they do lean RED. Commie Red.