We've got census growth data for every city, county, and district—and there are lots of surprises
If you thought that the suburbs of the major cities in the South and Southwest were the major battleground in the 2020 election, hold on to your butts for 2024: New census data released last week gives an even clearer picture of how these rapidly blue-shifting areas are also some of the fastest-growing terrain in the country.
Thursday’s drop included every last scrap of data from the 2020 census: the population of every county, every city, every school district—all the way down to every city block. These figures give state legislatures and commissions the green light to start the redistricting process for congressional maps, legislative districts, municipal constituencies, and much more.
It’s also a treasure trove of information for people interested in the demographic changes that are shaping our nation, and in turn, our nation’s politics, which is why we’ve crunched and compiled all of that data at the congressional district, county, and city levels.
We’ll begin, though, with the state-level numbers, which the Census Bureau published back in April. Unsurprisingly, Texas was by far the biggest gainer of population. What might surprise you is the state in the no. 3 slot: California. That’s because the Golden State actually lost a congressional seat in this year’s apportionment, breaking a nearly-century-long streak of constantly gaining seats. That naturally prompted some people to conclude that California had lost population, but far from it: The state gained over two million people over the last decade, despite its punishing housing prices.
If you’re wondering how that squares with losing a seat in the House, keep in mind that California is already much larger than any other state. A gain of “only” two million people while starting from such a high baseline means that California gained population at a slightly lower rate than the nation as a whole, enough for it to narrowly lose a congressional seat.
Only three states, in fact, actually shrank in absolute terms. Most significant is West Virginia, which, as expected, fell from three to two congressional seats. Illinois lost a seat, while Mississippi’s very small loss spared it from a further cut. On the left below are the biggest gainers, while on the right are the three losers and, right behind them, the two smallest gainers, Wyoming and Vermont (which also happen to be the two smallest states overall). Each state is color-coded based on which party carried it in last year’s presidential election.
STATE
CHANGE
STATE
CHANGE
Texas
+3,999,944
West Virginia
-59,278
Florida
+2,736,877
Illinois
-18,124
California
+2,284,267
Mississippi
-6,018
Georgia
+1,024,255
Wyoming
+13,225
Washington
+980,741
Vermont
+17,336
We can also look at the biggest gainers and losers among states by percentage rather than raw numbers. Interestingly, other than Texas, none of the fastest growers gained a seat this year. That’s because they’re all relatively small states starting from a low enough point that even rapid growth wasn’t enough to increase their representation. Idaho, however, only narrowly missed the cut for a third seat, while Nevada and Utah both gained seats in 2010, as part of their many-decades-long trend of rapid growth; those two states might both be in a position to gain their fifth seats in 2030 if they keep on the same trajectory.
STATE
CHANGE
STATE
CHANGE
Utah
+18.4%
West Virginia
-3.2%
Idaho
+17.3%
Mississippi
-0.2%
Texas
+15.9%
Illinois
-0.1%
North Dakota
+15.8%
Connecticut
+0.1%
Nevada
+15.0%
Michigan
+2.0%
Now let’s look at the population of our current congressional districts; this level of detail only became possible to examine with last week’s data release. This is related to, but separate from, our previous analysis of which districts will have to shrink or expand in redistricting (which looks at how their current population deviates from the “ideal” district population for each state); here, we’re looking simply at how much each district has changed population-wise over the decade from its starting point in 2010. Naturally, there’s a lot of overlap between the lists, though; the districts that have grown the most are also the ones that will have to shed the most people in redistricting to neighboring districts.
The biggest growth in raw population came in Texas’s 22nd District, located in Houston’s southern suburbs, primarily in Fort Bend County. As with many of these other districts on the list, this was once solidly red turf—the previous iteration of the 22nd was former House GOP Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s old district—that has moved increasingly in the Democratic direction. That’s the result of swift diversification with the addition of many Asian and Latino residents, as well as affluent college-educated voters souring on the current version of the Republican Party.
Close behind is Florida’s 9th, mostly in the suburbs of Orlando, which is a less affluent district than Texas’ 22nd (with a large force of service workers), but which is the epicenter of Puerto Rican migration to Florida. The 9th is one of the few districts on the list of biggest gainers that a Democrat represents in the House (along with Nevada’s 3rd district, in the suburbs of Las Vegas), though current trends could move at least some of these Texas districts (which may receive different numbers after redistricting) into the blue column as the decade unfolds.
Meanwhile, the districts that lost the most population are a mixed bag of urban and rural turf and mostly white and mostly Black districts. Within Illinois, for instance, which has four of the 10 biggest losers on the list, there’s a wide variety: the majority-Black 2nd is on Chicago’s South Side, while the Downstate 15th is mostly agricultural and white, with the 12th and 17th split between rural areas and declining industrial towns.
As for Mississippi’s 2nd district, which lost the most population, it covers both the state’s main city of Jackson and the rural, mostly Black Delta. On the other hand, West Virginia’s 3rd district and Ohio’s 6th district (in the state’s southeastern quadrant) are rural and almost entirely white districts at the core of Appalachia. We’ve color-coded these districts based on which party currently controls them, which is also the same as the 2020 presidential winner in every case except Illinois’ 17th, which was won by Democratic Rep. Cheri Bustos but carried narrowly by Donald Trump.
District
CHANGE
District
CHANGE
TX-22
+273,805
MS-02
-67,371
FL-09
+259,258
WV-03
-45,550
TX-26
+244,618
AR-04
-42,404
TX-10
+239,495
IL-17
-39,043
TX-31
+235,285
IL-12
-37,943
TX-03
+234,520
MI-05
-35,272
TX-08
+217,898
OH-06
-33,914
UT-04
+192,198
MO-01
-33,870
FL-16
+187,702
IL-02
-33,185
NV-03
+180,390
IL-15
-32,520
We’re not including a table of percentage change in the nation’s congressional districts because all districts start the decade with relatively similar populations. The list of the top 10 and bottom 10 districts by percentage change would, in fact, be the same 10 again (though in a slightly different order).
However, you can see those changes in the map just below, which is a cartogram that shows each district as the same size, with an extra-large zoomable version here. If you’d prefer to see the same data on a traditional map, we’ve got that as well.
Map of 2010-2020 population change by congressional district
Now let’s move on to the counties with the biggest numeric change. Again, the list of the biggest gainers is heavily weighted toward Texas, with six of the state’s most populous counties getting even bigger. Harris County, a behemoth that contains almost all of Houston plus most of its suburbs, leads the way. It’s followed by Arizona’s Maricopa County, which, similarly, contains all of Phoenix plus most of its suburbs. The one non-Sun Belt county in the top 10—although with this summer’s extreme weather, it too has been making a case to join that club—is King County, Washington, driven by Seattle’s rapid growth over the 10 years.
The list of counties losing the most population is, for the most part, not surprising, with industrial cities in decline leading the way. (Baltimore and St. Louis are independent cities, which are considered county-equivalent.) While these are mostly in the North, there are a few Southern locales, such as the counties that are home to Jackson, Mississippi (Hinds), and Shreveport, Louisiana (Caddo Parish).
The least-expected name on the list is Robeson County, North Carolina, which is much less populous and more rural than the others; it’s a county in eastern North Carolina with a large Native American population (chiefly of the Lumbee tribe) that fell from 134,000 to 117,000 over the last decade. It’s not exactly clear what drove this drop, though repeated flooding over recent years probably drove emigration on top of poor economic prospects. But it’s not an aberration, as other neighboring, smaller counties also lost population at a similar rate.
COUNTY
CHANGE
COUNTY
CHANGE
Harris, TX (Houston)
+638,686
Baltimore city, MD
-35,253
Maricopa, AZ (Phoenix)
+603,451
Wayne, MI (Detroit)
-27,023
King, WA (Seattle)
+338,426
Genesee, MI (Flint)
-19,579
Clark, NV (Las Vegas)
+314,192
St. Louis city, MO
-17,716
Tarrant, TX (Ft. Worth)
+301,606
Robeson, NC (Lumberton)
-17,638
Bexar, TX (San Antonio)
+294,551
Hinds, MS (Jackson)
-17,543
Orange, FL (Orlando)
+283,952
Caddo, LA (Shreveport)
-17,121
Collin, TX (Dallas suburbs)
+282,124
Cuyahoga, OH (Cleveland)
-15,305
Travis, TX (Austin)
+265,922
St. Clair, IL (E. St. Louis)
-12,656
Dallas, TX
+245,400
Kanawha, WV (Charleston)
-12,318
Switching to biggest gainers and losers by percentage change—as shown in the map at the top of this post—gives a totally different set of counties, most of which have very low populations and you probably haven’t heard of. The top two gainers are both in western North Dakota, which benefited greatly (though perhaps briefly) from the oil and gas extraction explosion in that region.
The rest of the gainers are previously rural counties where exurbs from nearby larger cities have recently started to creep in. Only three of the top 10 counties currently have more than 100,000 people; they’re Hays and Comal Counties in the corridor between San Antonio and Austin (anchored by San Marcos and New Braunfels, respectively), and Osceola County, south of Orlando, Florida, which is the core of the rapidly-growing 9th District mentioned earlier.
You might be surprised to also see so many Texas counties on the list of losers, given the state’s massive overall growth. However, Texas has far more counties than any other state—254 in total—many of which are in the Great Plains part of the state and are nearly empty. Dozens of them have only a few thousand residents apiece (some number in just the hundreds), and those without oil are getting even emptier; the loss of a few hundred residents makes a big difference percentage-wise.
However, the biggest drop nationwide was in Alexander County, Illinois, at the very southern tip of the state. Cairo, the county’s main population center, has long had a reputation as one of the country’s most dysfunctional small towns. HUD’s notorious closure of several housing projects in 2017 without providing any replacement housing may have been an unfortunate population tipping point.
COUNTY
CHANGE
COUNTY
CHANGE
McKenzie, ND
+131.2%
Alexander, IL
-36.4%
Williams, ND
+82.8%
Schleicher, TX
-29.2%
Hays, TX
+53.4%
Edwards, TX
-29.0%
Dallas, IA
+50.7%
Dickens, TX
-27.6%
Comal, TX
+48.9%
Blaine, OK
-26.9%
Bryan, GA
+48.0%
Tyrrell, NC
-26.4%
Wasatch, UT
+47.8%
McPherson, NE
-26.0%
Trousdale, TN
+47.6%
Quitman, MS
-24.9%
Lincoln, SD
+45.4%
Dooly, GA
-24.9%
Osceola, FL
+44.7%
Telfair, GA
-24.4%
Finally, let’s look at the biggest gains and losses among the nation’s cities, which may be more familiar. The biggest gainer by far was the nation’s largest city, New York City (though it doesn’t make the county list because each of its five boroughs is its own county, dividing the impact of its growth).
This development may seem surprising, given the abundant hot takes about the “death of the city” during the pandemic, what with everyone supposedly fleeing to the suburbs. Apparently, though, pundits’ anecdotes about their upper-middle-class neighbors are no match for data concerning the realities of the city’s many other millions of residents.
In fairness, the census was largely complete before the start of the pandemic, so it’s possible that next year’s population estimates could swerve the other way. It does seem, though, that a historic, one-time disruption is likely to be a less powerful force than long-term trends, especially since the pandemic brought down the cost of renting or owning in the notoriously pricey Big Apple.
Beyond New York, the list of the biggest gainers mostly features the usual Sun Belt suspects, along with Seattle and, interestingly, Columbus, which seems to be keeping all of Ohio afloat, population-wise.
Meanwhile, Detroit continues to lose population at an alarming pace, followed by some of the other names you’d expect to see, like Baltimore and Cleveland. Of note, though, are two places named Paradise. One is Paradise, Nevada, whose presence on the list appears to be a technicality. Paradise, the suburb that’s home to the Las Vegas Strip (which is not actually in Las Vegas), is one of the nation’s largest “census-designated places.” That means that it’s not an incorporated municipality, but there’s still enough consensus on its boundaries and what it’s called that the Census Bureau considers it city equivalent.
Given the overall rapid growth in the Las Vegas metropolitan area and especially Nevada’s 3rd district, what happened here isn’t actual depopulation but rather reijggering of Paradise’s Census Bureau-drawn boundaries. The 2020 Census gave a former portion of Paradise to the adjacent unincorporated census-designated place of Enterprise, which grew massively over the decade, narrowly missing the top 10 list (from 108,000 to 222,000 including the addition of the former Paradise residents).
The other Paradise on the list is a sadder story: Paradise, California’s population fell from 26,000 to 5,000 in 2018 after most of the town burned down in a forest fire. There were dozens of fatalities; most of the loss, though, was the result of out-migration. However, the town has since seen a rapid boom that has brought its population up to 6,000 and made it the fastest-growing city in the state. (It’s also the only one on this list that went for Trump.)
There’s one other unexpected name on the bottom 10, and that’s Aurora, Illinois. This is a blue-collar suburb of Chicago (and the setting of Wayne’s World) that grew rapidly in previous decades, doubling in population from 1990 to 2010. It appears to have taken a U-turn lately, though it could reflect a data collection problem, as Aurora’s 2020 numbers undershot its 2019 estimate by a similar 17,000 people.
CITY
CHANGE
CITY
CHANGE
New York City, NY
+629,057
Detroit, MI
-74,666
Houston, TX
+205,129
Baltimore, MD
-35,253
Ft. Worth, TX
+177,709
Paradise, NV
-31,929
Austin, TX
+171,465
Cleveland, OH
-24,191
Phoenix, AZ
+162,507
Paradise, CA
-21,454
Charlotte, NC
+143,155
Flint, MI
-21,182
Seattle, WA
+128,355
Jackson, MS
-19,813
Jacksonville, FL
+127,827
St. Louis, MO
-17,716
Columbus, OH
+118,715
Milwaukee, WI
-17,611
Denver, CO
+115,364
Aurora, IL
-17,357
Let’s also take a look at the biggest gains and losses among cities by percentage. Because base rates play such a big role here, we’re limiting this table to places with a population of 50,000 or more. As an example, consider Greenhorn, Oregon, which went from a population of zero in 2010 to a population of three in 2020. That’s an amazing gain of ∞%, but not a change with big demographic or political implications. (Greenhorn is a literal ghost town, but apparently, three living souls have now returned.)
Even then, the list of the biggest gainers consists of places most people haven’t heard of (at least, not yet); it’s mostly suburbs that have sprung into being over the last decade. A case in point is Horizon West, Florida, a master-planned community in Orange County near Walt Disney World, which went from a population of 14,000 in 2010 to 58,000 in 2020. On its own, it was a major contributor to the rapid growth in the Orlando area. The most recognizable name on the top 10 list is Macon, Georgia, which came about its big gain the easy way: It nearly doubled its population by forming a unified city-county government with its surroundings in Bibb County.
Meanwhile, the cities losing the most population, percentage-wise, tend to be the smaller Midwestern cities known for industrial decline, most notably Flint, Michigan (whose woes this decade were compounded by the scandalous problems with its water system), but also similar places like Gary, Indiana and Youngstown, Ohio. Detroit’s loss in population was large enough, though, that it makes the list despite starting from a much higher baseline.
CITY
CHANGE
CITY
CHANGE
Horizon West, FL
+315.0%
Flint, MI
-20.7%
Herriman, UT
+153.1%
Paradise, NV
-14.3%
Queen Creek, AZ
+125.8%
Saginaw, MI
-14.2%
Leander, TX
+123.2%
Gary, IN
-13.9%
Four Corners, FL
+115.9%
Jackson, MS
-11.4%
Enterprise, NV
+104.5%
Detroit, MI
-10.5%
Kirkland, WA
+88.9%
Youngstown, OH
-10.3%
Westchester, FL
+88.8%
Aurora, IL
-8.8%
Buckeye, AZ
+79.9%
Decatur, IL
-7.4%
Macon, GA
+72.2%
Camden, NJ
-7.2%
Not seeing what you’re interested in, in terms of your particular city, county, or congressional district? Please click through to our full Google sheet, which has the 2010 and 2020 populations, and numeric and percentage change for every district, every county, and every city (so long as they existed in both 2010 and 2020). Keep in mind that all the listed cities add up to around 247 million people; the remaining 84 million people in the United States live outside an incorporated city or census-designated place.