Tyler Simko
banner
simko.bsky.social
Tyler Simko
@simko.bsky.social
State & local politics + computational social science.

tylersimko.com
Dense, high Hispanic counties like Hudson also point against the ‘24 red shift constituting a lasting “new” NJ. Cities like Perth Amboy saw large ‘24 Trump shifts, but supported Sherrill on Tuesday with overwhelming margins.

Read more from me and @kabirkhanna.bsky.social for #CBSDataDesk🍎 below!
NJ's bluest counties saw biggest turnout increases, propelling landslide

Three densest counties saw largest jumps from '21:
Hudson (Jersey City), Essex (Newark), Union
>30% increase in total vote
>30-pt Democratic margin

High-profile local races helped, e.g., Jersey City mayoral w/ former gov

1/2
November 6, 2025 at 6:05 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
NJ's bluest counties saw biggest turnout increases, propelling landslide

Three densest counties saw largest jumps from '21:
Hudson (Jersey City), Essex (Newark), Union
>30% increase in total vote
>30-pt Democratic margin

High-profile local races helped, e.g., Jersey City mayoral w/ former gov

1/2
November 6, 2025 at 1:06 AM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
NYC map shaded by vote margin!

We collected very granular precinct data and aggregated it to neighborhoods people actually recognize

Bushwick, Flushing, Upper West Side, etc.

datawrapper.dwcdn.net/Wrd72/

H/T @mitelectionlab.bsky.social @chriskenny.bsky.social @corymccartan.com @simko.bsky.social
2025 NYC Mayoral Race by Neighborhood
CBS News estimates of how different parts of the city voted
datawrapper.dwcdn.net
November 5, 2025 at 5:27 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Mamdani's win by NYC neighborhood: datawrapper.dwcdn.net/Wrd72/4/

Hover over map to see our estimates...

#CBSDataDesk🍎
2025 NYC Mayoral Race by Neighborhood
datawrapper.dwcdn.net
November 5, 2025 at 2:56 AM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Here at the CBS News data desk with @chriskenny.bsky.social and @simko.bsky.social! Looking at the VA numbers
November 5, 2025 at 12:55 AM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Supported by both the Fordham Institute and @wallacefoundation.bsky.social, Michael Hartney and I explored the extent to which U.S. school board members are politically and demographically representative of the communities they serve.

Here's a summary of our main findings:

1/12
October 8, 2025 at 2:08 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
👀 Local governments often take "symbolic" stances on issues where they hold no authority or jurisdiction. @simko.bsky.social and Taran Samarth examine the dynamics and purpose of "symbolic representation" by studying the response of US local governments to the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. #APSA2025
September 8, 2025 at 4:04 PM
Trump’s proposed rush job Census isn’t just immoral and regressive—it will harm communities across the country and compromise data quality: @chriskenny.bsky.social and I in @thehill.com today:

thehill.com/opinion/camp...
Trump’s proposed snap Census won’t get him the seats he wants
A new Census would likely diminish political representation for Republican areas.
thehill.com
August 28, 2025 at 3:36 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Do you use tract boundaries in your research? Jake Brown, @simko.bsky.social, and I have a new working paper (osf.io/preprints/so...): Any Way You Slice It: Racial Segregation Statistics are Robust to Aggregation Bias

We show that tract-level segregation is robust to MAUP using simulation methods.
OSF
osf.io
August 27, 2025 at 7:44 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
"shifts in political geography and gerrymandering reduced the number of highly competitive districts by over 25% [from 2010 to 2020], with geographic polarization driving most of the decline."
Timely WP from our ALARM project team: we generated over 200k simulated maps for the 2010 cycle, to compare against our existing 2020 simulations. This lets us disentangle changes in gerrymandering from changes in political geography!

alarm-redist.org/papers/ggpre...
August 22, 2025 at 4:42 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
In our polarized political environment, I’m excited to share my new ASR publication: “Competence over Partisanship: Party Affiliation Does Not Affect the Selection of School District Superintendents”. journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
July 22, 2025 at 11:20 PM
Great article, and a good example of the continuing value of public, open source research tools (we published these simulations in 2022). When new claims and arguments arise, anyone can use existing resources to examine them.
NYT used our ALARM project redistricting simulations to talk about geographic bias against the parties and what counts as "fair" in redistricting!

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
Is Massachusetts a Gerrymandered State?
Can you recognize a gerrymander?
www.nytimes.com
August 21, 2025 at 5:26 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
You may have noticed things are happening fast in the world of redistricting…

I along with @maxwellpalmer.com and @simko.bsky.social wrote an article last week (though published today) that analyzes the changes to the congressional district map in Texas, and particularly San Antonio.
Republicans are seeking to create a durable gerrymander in Texas
Short-term tactical gains in Texas could ultimately yield a race to the bottom.
www.expressnews.com
August 8, 2025 at 11:49 AM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Texas was already arguably the biggest Republican gerrymander in the nation, according to this PNAS paper by @chriskenny.bsky.social @corymccartan.com @simko.bsky.social @shirokuriwaki.bsky.social www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...
July 20, 2025 at 12:22 AM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Is government suspicion based on real lived experiences and historic harm? #ISRNextGeneration scholar Franshelly Martinez-Ortiz writes on the case of Michigan, where events like the Flint Water Crisis give rise to lasting mistrust. @maraceci.bsky.social #MPSA2025 ➡️
cpsblog.isr.umich.edu?p=3434
In Michigan, conspiracy thinking can be rooted in real historic harm
Conspiracy thinking may result from paranoia or misinformation -- but it's often rooted actual harms and well-earned mistrust in government.
cpsblog.isr.umich.edu
March 31, 2025 at 6:56 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Urban–rural cleavages are seen as a defining political divide. But does this polarization hold worldwide? My new working paper tests this question using an original dataset of granular, geocoded election returns from 106 countries (polling station-level in 70). (1/8)
February 14, 2025 at 3:14 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
How can state and local government partnerships help to safeguard US official statistics when they are under assault? Find out in my @univpressofkansas.bsky.social book, "Counting Like a State".

Preorder for a 30% discount with code 24COUNTING here: kansaspress.ku.edu/9780700639687/
January 23, 2025 at 1:24 PM
As a first-generation college student, I found it difficult to adjust to university academics and the “hidden curriculum.” How can universities help students ease this transition?

In a new RCT, we (Rebecca Johnson, Kosuke Imai) show “summer bridge” programs can be valuable tools: shorturl.at/WS9Kf
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
shorturl.at
January 23, 2025 at 3:11 PM
Reposted by Tyler Simko
Are Democratic leaders making cities more dangerous than Republicans? Trump + others have repeatedly made claims like this. New paper in Science Advances w/ @chriswarshaw.bsky.social, Dan Jones & Matt Harvey shows that, in short, the answer is no.
January 15, 2025 at 10:39 PM