Politics
How Red and Blue America Shop, Eat and Live
There are thousands of golf courses in the United States. You can find them in every state, in nearly every county; there’s probably one near you.
Take all those data points, and you can see that there are more golf courses for every 100,000 voters in redder neighborhoods than in blue ones.
There are also thousands of breweries in the U.S., but they’re much more concentrated on the coasts and in urban areas.
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The brewery-to-voter ratio is much higher in some of the country’s bluest precincts, where Joe Biden won the vote in 2020.
You can’t tell how people vote just by whether they enjoy a drink at a brewery or a round of golf. But the geographic distribution of these two places shows how much our surroundings differ, often unintentionally, along political lines.
It’s not just golf and brewing: People in America’s reddest neighborhoods see a different landscape of stores, restaurants and venues when they step outside their homes than those in more politically even precincts or the very bluest areas.
We wanted to look at this relationship between politics and the places around us. So, using data from the Overture Maps Foundation, we took the location of millions of different stores, restaurants, churches, parks and more and lined them up with the 2020 election results, down to the precinct.
We don’t know who goes to each place. But we know how the neighborhoods surrounding each locale vote.
The results are sometimes obvious: Yoga studios and cocktail bars skew toward deeply blue spaces, and gun stores and farms toward redder precincts. But they show how our politics, geography and lives intersect, not always in obvious ways.
In many cases, these graphs look the way they do largely because of the urban-rural divide. Certain activities, like golf, need space, and the more rural parts of the country tend to vote for Republicans. Meanwhile, a small, Democratic-leaning urban area might be a commercial hub for a redder county, with a brewery, coffee shop and bookstore; those businesses would look blue in our data set even if they were frequented equally by Republicans and Democrats.
“The placement of businesses is probably motivated primarily by income level and population density,” said Nick Rogers, a sociology professor at the University of Pittsburgh. “It just so happens that an area’s political ideology is highly correlated with these things.”
Some places, of course, are just everywhere:
And some kinds of places don’t fit easily into one bucket or the other.
Consider Baptist churches: A majority of the tens of thousands of these churches in the U.S. are in the South. That means they’re heavily concentrated in both Republican neighborhoods and largely Black, heavily Democratic areas. The resulting distribution looks like this:
Wineries, too, show a double hump. You can see that in California alone — with wine production clustered along both its bluer coastline and the redder Central Valley.
For many brands, the partisan map emerges from the regional footprint of the business. Piggly Wiggly mostly serves redder states in the South, while Food Lion is spread across a more politically varied area in the Southeast.
But the maps cut across people and places in different ways. A liberal voter in Los Angeles may have never heard of Piggly Wiggly. But it’s also possible that person has never heard of Stop & Shop, a supermarket in the bluer Northeast.
Other brands that aren’t so regionally clustered have expanded in pursuit of the clientele they already know. For example, Whole Foods, Peet’s Coffee and the upscale sportswear brand Lululemon have a high-earning urban customer base.
The Overture data in this analysis reflects businesses and places that have logged their locations on either Meta or Microsoft platforms; the data is imperfect and includes mislabeled locations and closed stores. But this is the best publicly available data set of its kind, and it lets us see patterns in the data that aren’t captured by surveys of consumer preference.
Here’s a roundup of them.
Fast food
One fast food chain in many deep blue precincts is Popeyes. The chicken purveyor is found in many Southern cities but also across the West Coast and up and down I-95.
Its competitor Chick-fil-A — despite an early 2010s controversy over gay rights — is also in many blue areas.
Among the chains found in redder places are Tennessee-based Hardee’s and Oklahoma-based Sonic.
And Burger King, like McDonald’s, is everywhere.
Coffee shops
Starbucks is by far the nation’s largest coffee chain, and while it might feel as if it’s everywhere, it hews toward slightly denser locations.
Some smaller coffee chains have a more significant skew. West Coast chains like Blue Bottle and Peet’s Coffee are common in some of the bluest areas; the largest chain in our data with a strong presence in redder areas is Scooter’s Coffee.
Breakfast spots
IHOP neighborhoods are bluer than those around the largely Midwestern restaurant Bob Evans. Huddle House is the major breakfast chain with the highest frequency in red areas in our data.
Convenience stores
7-Eleven started in Texas, but it has since spread across many blue places.
Regional convenience store chains in redder areas include Casey’s General Store and Allsup’s.
Religious institutions
The headquarters of the Mormon Church are in blue Salt Lake City. But it has many temples in rural parts of the Mountain West.
First Congregational Church, on the other hand, is a common name for a church in the United Church of Christ, a socially liberal Protestant denomination common in New England.
First United Methodist churches are in redder areas:
Hindu and Buddhist temples are both typically in more liberal areas.
Professionals
Occupations also have recognizable patterns in our data, probably in large part because of the rural-urban political divide.
Some professions lend themselves to cities:
Others, to the countryside:
And yet others can find business just about anywhere:
Leisure
A lot of the activities we do for fun also map across politics.
Services
Even basic services follow similar patterns. Fire departments skew red because they have to be everywhere, regardless of how many people live there. Even a small, rural area needs a fire department. When you consider population density, you get this:
Elementary schools, meanwhile, are more population dependent.
Train stations, including those with subway stops, tend to be in more urban areas.
And propane suppliers, though everywhere, typically have more business in rural areas, farther from natural gas pipelines.
Taken together, the patterns are a reminder of how big and varied the country is — in its places and its politics.
You can explore the distribution of 100 large coffee chains, grocery stores, shops and other places below.
See More: Political Geography of 100 Large American Businesses
Methodology
Place of interest data is from Meta and Microsoft via the Overture Maps Foundation. Nearly 10 million places were used in this analysis. This is the most comprehensive data set of its kind available publicly, but it is by no means perfect.
The data includes businesses and places that have logged their locations on either Meta or Microsoft platforms as of Oct. 23, either through an individual social media account, or when a large chain offers all of its location data to the platforms. Locations may also be included if they were mentioned by users in posts to Meta and Microsoft apps.
The data includes some erroneous locations, typos, mislabeled locations and closed stores. It may also omit businesses that have not yet put their information online. To limit the inclusion of bad data, we filtered the data using Overture’s confidence measure and excluded locations with fewer than 15 votes.
The 2020 precinct-level election results were compiled from Harvard Dataverse. For each precinct, the vote margin was calculated by comparing the number of votes for Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
Politics
McCarthy says Trump will use ‘everything he can’ to force Senate action on SAVE America Act
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As infighting over the SAVE America Act throws congressional Republicans into disarray, President Donald Trump’s bid to get the stalled election bill across the finish line gained one notable ally.
Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., told Fox News Digital that he supports the election integrity measure and indicated that Trump should continue to use every available tool to pressure the Senate to pass it.
“He’s going to try everything he can to make sure he passes that through,” McCarthy said in a brief interview outside the U.S. Capitol.
The ex-speaker’s comments came after Trump abruptly called off a signing ceremony Wednesday for a bipartisan housing bill to pressure the Republican-controlled Senate to act on the SAVE America Act.
President Donald Trump boards Air Force One as he departs Reading Regional Airport in Reading, Pa., on June 23, 2026. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters)
IRATE REPUBLICANS ACCUSE TRUMP OF HANDING DEMOCRATS A WIN AFTER BLOWING UP HOUSING PACKAGE
The move surprised Republican lawmakers, some of whom were praising the bill’s passage at a press conference when Trump’s Truth Social post broke.
But Trump has repeatedly cast the election measure — requiring proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections and voter identification requirements — as his top legislative priority.
The legislation’s momentum, however, has slowed in the upper chamber, where Republican leadership insists the votes aren’t there amid widespread Democratic opposition. Senate Republicans have also been unwilling to eliminate the legislative filibuster, which requires a 60-vote threshold to pass the legislation.
Former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy speaks during a ceremony honoring President Ronald Reagan on the 115th anniversary of his birthday at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., on Feb. 6, 2026. (Hans Gutknecht/MediaNews Group)
TRUMP CALLS MAIL IN VOTING CORRUPT AS SENATE BEGINS DEBATE ON SAVE ACT REQUIRING VOTER ID
Amid the SAVE standoff, a group of conservative lawmakers effectively shut down the House floor in an effort to force Senate action on the election bill.
But the Senate recessed Wednesday for two weeks over the July 4 holiday, leaving the measure in limbo until lawmakers return.
The conservative-led blockade sparked fierce backlash, with several members inside the GOP conference telling Fox News Digital the move risked torpedoing their own legislative agenda.
Meanwhile, the House has also yet to pass a version of the legislation incorporating several of the president’s priorities, including a mail-in voting crackdown and provisions banning men from competing in women’s sports and child sex change procedures.
Trump has not indicated whether he will sign the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, despite the likely existence of a veto-proof majority.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters Thursday that the housing bill had been transmitted to the White House for Trump’s signature following a meeting with the president.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., talks with reporters in the U.S. Capitol on June 10, 2026. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
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Trump now has 10 days to sign the package or veto it. If he does nothing, the legislation automatically becomes law at the end of the 10-day period.
WASHINGTON — California’s two Democratic senators on Thursday criticized the Trump administration after it requested $87.6 billion from Congress to address some of the nation’s most “urgent needs” but omitted funding for victims of last year’s Los Angeles wildfires.
“Donald Trump’s desire to punish Los Angeles and the state of California for not voting for him, means once again that thousands of Angelinos are left watching this administration fight for anything but them, their businesses, and their communities,” Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff said in a joint statement.
“These fires did not discriminate based on party or political preference. Neither should this administration,” they added.
The omission is the latest strain in a yearlong standoff between California leaders and the Trump administration over federal disaster aid, and it comes after Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger met with President Trump at the Oval Office in April to request the funding.
At the meeting, Trump signaled his commitment to working with local officials to help with disaster recovery efforts. The officials asked for $16 billion that would be split between the city and county. The money would consist primarily of disbursements from the Federal Emergency Management Agency flagged for communities hit by the fires, part of a $33.9-billion wildfire relief funding request made by Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Two months later, those talks have yet to yield results sought by local leaders.
The budget request, submitted by the Office of Management and Budget on Wednesday, mostly seeks funding for the Pentagon to address costs related to the Iran war. It also includes $11.1 billion in economic assistance for American farmers, $1.4 billion to address the Ebola virus outbreak in Central Africa, $500 million to support “ongoing efforts to complete restorations and construction projects” across the nation’s capital and $1 billion to boost the pensions of workers at General Motors that were cut as a result of the automaker’s bankruptcy.
“I urge the Congress to take action on these important and urgent requests as soon as possible,” White House budget director Russell Vought wrote in a letter addressed to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).
Vought said the administration was open to discussing “additional relief for other urgent matters.” The White House did not immediately respond when asked why the budget request did not mention the Eaton and Palisades disaster relief funds.
State leaders, including Newsom, have repeatedly accused the Trump administration of stonewalling billions in wildfire aid. The governor visited Washington in December to meet with lawmakers, including three who serve on the Senate and House appropriations committees, to push for the funding.
The governor also attempted to meet with FEMA about the matter, but said his request was denied. Newsom, a political foe of Trump’s, would not say whether he had attempted to meet with Trump to talk about the recovery efforts.
Politics
Trump administration pledges $150M in aid, deploys Navy warships after deadly Venezuela earthquakes
Secretary Rubio details US aid to Venezuela after earthquakes
Secretary Rubio, in Manama, Bahrain, outlines the comprehensive U.S. government response to the devastating back-to-back earthquakes in Venezuela. He confirms immediate deployment of search and rescue teams, medical resources and humanitarian assistance, emphasizing the urgency to save lives. Rubio reiterates President Donald Trump’s commitment to supporting Venezuela and collaborating with international partners on recovery efforts and long-term stability.
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Following a catastrophic set of earthquakes that left at least 235 people dead in Venezuela, the Trump administration has activated a government-wide humanitarian response, pledging $150 million in aid and deploying U.S. Navy warships to assist in life-saving rescue operations.
The rapid mobilization Thursday comes after back-to-back magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 earthquakes rocked northern Venezuela roughly 120 miles west of Caracas Wednesday night.
The rare earthquake “doublet” injured more than 940 people and turned the state of La Guaira into a disaster zone, while forcing the closure of the damaged Simón Bolívar International Airport, according to Venezuela’s Health Ministry.
US RESCUE TEAMS TO DESCEND ON HARD-HIT CARIBBEAN AFTER CATASTROPHIC HURRICANE MELISSA’S IMPACT
Rescuers search for victims in a collapsed building following an earthquake in Caracas on June 24, 2026. (Manaure Quintero / AFP via Getty Images)
The U.S. Department of State announced on Thursday it is mobilizing $150 million in aid, which includes $50 million in new bilateral awards for relief partners on the ground — such as Samaritan’s Purse, Catholic Relief Services and World Vision — along with a $100 million contribution to a United Nations humanitarian pooled fund.
To spearhead efforts on the ground, the State Department has deployed a regional Disaster Assistance Response Team alongside two highly specialized urban search-and-rescue teams from fire departments in Fairfax County, Virginia, and Los Angeles County, California.
U.S. WARSHIPS TO PATROL INTERNATIONAL WATERS AROUND VENEZUELA AS TRUMP VOWS TO STOP CARTELS
Members of the County of Los Angeles Fire Department’s international urban search and rescue team (USA-2) prepare to leave for Venezuela, in Pacoima, Calif., Thursday. (Blake Fagan/AFP via Getty Images)
U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) said it is surging assigned U.S. military forces to the region, directing the USS Fort Lauderdale and the USS Billings to Venezuela to back the State Department-led operations.
The USS Fort Lauderdale will serve as a “floating command center” with a flight deck to support heavy-lift helicopters and a well deck to launch landing craft, according to SOUTHCOM.
Meanwhile, the agile USS Billings will provide critical support close to the shorelines to accelerate the disaster response missions.
U.S. SOUTHCOM said it has directed USS Fort Lauderdale (LPD 28) and USS Billings (LCS 15) to Venezuela to support State Department-led U.S. government relief operations in Venezuela. (@Southcom/X)
SOUTHCOM said it is also sending rotary-wing aircraft, which will provide critical life-saving airlift support, transporting U.S. government response personnel, search and rescue teams and partners during relief operations.
Amid the crisis, the State Department emphasized that the safety of U.S. citizens remains the administration’s highest priority.
“The Trump Administration has no higher priority than the safety and security of Americans. The Department of State is working tirelessly to provide consular assistance to U.S. citizens and their families in the affected areas,” officials wrote in a statement. “The United States remains steadfast in its commitment to helping Venezuela recover from this devastating disaster and will continue to explore additional ways to provide meaningful assistance during this critical time.”
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U.S. citizens in Venezuela are urged to enroll in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP) and can contact the State Department 24/7 at 202-501-4444 for emergency assistance.
Family members in the U.S. seeking information on loved ones can call toll-free at 888-407-4747.
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