The traditional swing county is now the only Philadelphia collar county where registered Republicans outnumber Democrats.
For the first time in a decade and a half, Republicans can claim a majority of voter registrations, a milestone the Bucks County GOP and other conservative operatives celebrated on social media.
Pennsylvania Department of State voter registration data shows Republicans, as of July 22nd, now hold an edge of 198,045 Republican voters to 187,781 Democrats. Republicans started to turn the Democrat voter registration trend around in 2010, and 14 years later they finally hold a majority.
Until now, Democrats have strongly held the lead in registrations since they took the majority in 2008. Over the 16 years holding the majority, the Democrats’ lead ballooned by as much as 10,000 voters or 12% of the county’s electorate until the recent turn towards Republicans. As recently as November of 2023, Democrats had nearly 4,000 more registered voters, but the GOP has since closed and surpassed that deficit.
Voter registration, however, only tells part of the story.
Republicans have made significant voter registration gains since Democrats notably reached their registration peak during the reelection of Barack Obama in 2012. Despite the increase, the GOP has not had recent statewide electoral success. Republicans lost the state in the 2020 presidential election by 1.5 points and were dominated in the 2022 midterms with Gov. Shapiro and Democrat John Fetterman winning their races by 15 and 5 points respectively.
These electoral results, for the most part, have filtered down to Bucks County, too. Despite the recent Republican voter registration gains in Bucks, Biden carried the County over Trump by 5 points in 2020, and Shapiro and Fetterman outperformed their statewide total, carrying the County by 20 and 7 points.
The unique outlier is who Bucks County continually elects to Congress. A Republican – Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick or his late brother former Congressman Mike Fitzpatrick – has held the Bucks County congressional seat since defeating Democrat Patrick Murphy in the 2010 midterm elections. Bucks voters may support Democrats at the top of the ticket, but the Fitzpatrick’s campaigning continues to earn Republican support at the congressional level.
