Conservatives Greatly Outnumber Liberals in 19 U.S. States

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The residents of most U.S. states are more likely to identify as conservative than as liberal in their political ideology. In 25 states, the conservative advantage is significantly greater than the national average, including 19 "highly conservative" states in which conservatives outnumber liberals by at least 20 percentage points. Meanwhile, in six states, there are more liberals than conservatives.

Nationally, the conservative advantage in ideological identification is nine percentage points, and reflects a narrowing of the conservative-liberal gap from 21 points in 2004.

These findings are based on aggregated data from Gallup's 2018 tracking poll in which respondents were asked to indicate whether they describe their political views as liberal, moderate or conservative.

States in which the conservative-liberal gap is 20 points or greater are considered "highly conservative." The "more conservative than average" states have gaps of between 15 and 19 points. "About average" states' residents prefer the conservative description by seven to 14 points, and those with gaps of zero to six points are considered "less conservative than average."

The number of states in which more residents identify as liberal than as conservative is down slightly from nine in 2017. Many of the changes are within the margin of error for the state's sample -- states that barely tilted liberal in 2017 barely tilted conservative in 2018 -- so it is unclear how meaningful these changes are.

Mississippi ranked as the most conservative state in 2018, with 50% of residents identifying as conservative and 12% as liberal, for a gap of 38 points. Twenty-nine percent of Mississippians said they are moderate, and 9% had no opinion.

Massachusetts was the most liberal state in 2018, with 35% of its residents describing their political views as liberal and 21% as conservative. Massachusetts was the first state Gallup measured with more liberal than conservative identifiers (in 2008) and has been the state most consistently leaning more liberal than conservative.

The full results for each state follow.

	Conservative	Moderate	Liberal	Conservative advantage	N
	%	%	%	Pct. pts.
Mississippi	50	29	12	38	666
Alabama	46	34	14	32	1,275
South Dakota	44	37	13	31	303
Louisiana	43	35	15	28	1,117
Wyoming	46	31	18	28	286
West Virginia	45	31	17	28	445
Tennessee	43	34	17	26	1,692
Arkansas	41	38	15	26	758
Utah	41	40	15	26	952
South Carolina	41	37	16	25	1,262
Oklahoma	43	35	18	25	1,073
Idaho	40	37	17	23	591
Alaska	40	38	17	23	232
Indiana	39	38	17	22	1,575
Kansas	39	38	18	21	746
Montana	39	38	18	21	427
North Dakota	39	41	18	21	241
Missouri	41	34	20	21	1,532
Georgia	39	35	19	20	2,214
Kentucky	39	35	20	19	1,124
Texas	38	36	20	18	5,898
New Mexico	38	37	20	18	653
North Carolina	39	33	21	18	2,433
Arizona	37	36	21	16	948
Ohio	37	35	22	15	2,629
Nebraska	36	38	22	14	507
Florida	36	36	22	14	4,709
Iowa	35	39	21	14	825
Wisconsin	35	37	24	11	1,447
Michigan	33	38	23	10	2,319
Nevada	33	38	23	10	647
Pennsylvania	34	36	24	10	3,272
Virginia	33	37	24	9	2,022
Colorado	33	37	26	7	1,549
Minnesota	32	37	25	7	1,507
Delaware	29	43	24	5	250
Rhode Island	29	40	25	4	298
Illinois	31	36	27	4	2,374
Oregon	32	35	28	4	1,316
Connecticut	30	38	27	3	927
New Jersey	29	37	27	2	1,860
Maine	35	29	33	2	412
Maryland	29	39	28	1	1,337
California	29	36	29	0	8,116
New Hampshire	28	36	30	-2	350
New York	27	35	30	-3	4,591
Washington	28	37	31	-3	1,980
Vermont	28	36	32	-4	249
Hawaii	22	45	28	-6	301
Massachusetts	21	38	35	-14	1,623
Based on 2018 Gallup tracking. Data for AK, DE, HI, ND, RI, SD, VT and WY based on combined data from 2018 Gallup tracking and 2018 Gallup Poll Social Series surveys.
Gallup

Editor's Note: The story has been updated to correct the sample size of national adults.