Do your own DD on both ...
“Not to mention that when color TV first came in ..... Red represented Democrats...Blue Republicans on voting night.”
Those of us of a certain vintage remember Red always represented the party currently in power, and Blue the challenger.
That changed in 2004 when people began to call them Red States and Blue States after the Bush/Kerry election. After that the colors stuck.
“Not to mention that when color TV first came in ..... Red represented Democrats...Blue Republicans on voting night...but that changed all at once”
The first recorded use of colors was in Texas. Red for republican, blue for democrats to aid non-English speaking voters.
Election Maps on TV
During the early days of maps and later electronic maps on television, between 1976 and 2004, color choices were far from standard. Some sources report that networks alternated the color of the incumbent party every four years between red and blue, the two non-white colors of the U.S. flag. Others point to NBC’s John Chancellor who asked the techs at the network to rig up a lighted map to show who won each state. A state would glow red for Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, and blue for Gerald Ford, a Republican. That map was wildly popular, so by 1980 the three major networks had similar maps, but used different color schemes. NBC stuck with its original colors, while from 1984 CBS used the opposite symbology. In 1976, ABC used yellow and blue, but went to red for Republicans and blue for Democrats in 1980 and 1984. In 1980, yellow was set aside for John Anderson, an Independent, should he win a state. (He did not.)
By 1996, symbology was still a mix. The three major networks and CNN, plus the New York Times, used red for Republicans and blue for Democrats. Time Magazine and the Washington Post had the colors reversed.
Election 2000
The 2000 election between Bush and Gore was so close and so contested that ultimately the Supreme Court got involved. During the time of confusion, perhaps for the best, the public and news outlets spoke of “red states” and “blue states” and created a de facto standard, today’s familiar red for Republican, blue for Democrats. That year, the New York Times published its first color election map and followed the new standard. The graphics editor who made the decision for the paper had a different explanation. Archie Tse explained that “Republican” and “red” start with the letter “R.”
https://www.directionsmag.com/article/1721