This is why they so strenuously object to federal assistance in cities' law enforcement. Without overwhelming city vote totals, Democrats' political control in states across America would collapse.

President Trump has repeatedly injected federal resources into city law enforcement – Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Memphis, and now Portland and Chicago – where he has deemed crime to be out of local authorities' ability or will to control it. At each intervention, national Democrat leaders have loudly protested – even in Washington, where Mayor Bowser acknowledged crime was down.

Apart from playing to their national base, Democrats' protests rest on the reality that their power depends on maintaining their monopoly grip on cities' huge vote totals. Of America'stop 20 cities, Democrats control 18; of the top 40, Democrats control 32; of the top 100, Democrats control 66. Notably, America's 33rd largest city, Fresno, California, is the largest to have a Republican mayor in a Blue state.

For Democrats, control of cities' huge populations means control of the states in which these are located. As examples: New York City makes up 44.3% of New York state's population; Chicago is 21.6% of Illinois' population; Albuquerque is 26.5% of New Mexico's; Portland is 15.3% of Oregon's. And these are just single-city examples; in some states, control of several big cities (e.g., Minneapolis and St. Paul are 12.8% of Minnesota's population; Denver and Colorado Springs are 20% of Colorado's population) make for similarly overwhelming percentages.

Why this is so important for Democrats nationally can be seen from 2024's presidential election results. Between the coasts, Democrats were barely competitive, losing over 70% of the electoral votes cast outside California, Washington, New York, and Massachusetts.

Even winning the less than 30% the electoral votes Democrats won between America's coasts required them to win states like Illinois, Minnesota, Colorado, and New Mexico – states where Democrat-controlled city populations were significantly larger percentages of their populations than the popular vote percentage that separated Kamala Harris from Donald Trump in them. Even New York, a Democrat bastion (the last Republican presidential victory there was Ronald Reagan's in 1984) is a dramatic example: While New York City is 44.3% of New York state's population, Harris beat Trump by only 12.6 percentage points there: She did so by winning 67.7% of New York City votes – almost 1 million more than Trump and almost her entire margin of victory in New York state.