Are rural attitudes just Republican?

Abstract

Abstract Rural residents are typically construed as being more conservative than urban residents. Is this true, or do rural residents carry unique interests from Republicans or conservatives? Using the 2020 ANES, we compare responses from 22 national issues by interacting urban and rural residency with Republican and Democrat identification. We find that issue preferences are partisan, not place-based: rural Democrats resemble their urban counterparts and urban Republicans resemble their rural counterparts, rather than rural areas specifically being more Republican. However, rural Democrats are more conservative than urban Democrats on issues relating to immigration, transgendered people in the military, and income inequality. These results point to partisan nationalization in issue stances, with exceptions, and that rural is not always Republican.