Report: Red States Growing Faster Than Blue States

The population in Republican red states is growing faster than in Democrat-dominated blue states, new Census Bureau data shows.

According to the statistics released Tuesday, North Dakota was the nation’s fastest-growing state from July 2013 to July 2014, with a population increase of 2.2 percent, followed by the 1.7 percent growth in Nevada and Texas.

The rest of the top 10 in percentage growth between 2013 and 2014 were Colorado, with 1.59 percent, the District of Columbia, with 1.51 percent; Florida, with 1.49 percent; Arizona, with 1.45 percent; Utah, with 1.38 percent; Idaho, with 1.34 percent; and South Carolina, with 1.27 percent.

The states with the largest numeric increase in population were Texas, at No. 1, with 451,321, followed by California, Florida, Georgia, Arizona, North Carolina, Washington, Colorado, South Carolina, and Virginia, which posted a numeric increase of 55, 944, the data shows.

The Census Bureau reports each of the 10 fastest-growing states was in the South or West with the exception of North Dakota.

The Washington Post, which also crunched the numbers, reports in "raw terms," red states grew by about a million people, while blue states grew by about 941,000 between 2013 and 2014.

The Post notes since 2000, states that were red in 2012 grew much more than states that were blue, which led to a redistribution of House seats to states in the South and West — and to a reallocation of electoral votes.

But if the GOP might be understandably pleased with the growth numbers, "it does you no good until 2020, when electoral votes and House seats get shifted around again," Post political blogger Philip Bump reports.

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