While I was staring at my computer screen on election night, I noticed what looked like a trend: Amanda Janoo was badly underperforming in the Burlington suburbs. The trend held through the evening and into the final results. This fact alone didn’t sink her campaign, but it blocked any chance she had of winning.

The two Burlington-area maplets above, taken from the Secretary of State’s election results website, tell the story in a glance. On the left is the race for lieutenant governor; if a town is blue, then Molly Gray won a majority of its votes. And yes, they’re all blue. Incumbent LG John Rodgers was skunked. (The tiny red sliver at the top of the LG image is the southern tip of Georgia, the closest Rodgers got to scoring in the Burlington area.) On the right is the governor’s race; the beige towns went for Janoo while the red ones gave majority support to Gov. Phil Scott. Janoo did win in some places, but mainly with very narrow majorities — not nearly enough to offset Republican votes elsewhere in Vermont.

We’re talking reliable Democratic territory here. Republicans are woefully uncompetitive in all but one community, Milton, which largely elected Democrats this time. But the governor did extremely well in the places surrounding Burlington. Shockingly well, compared to the rest of his party’s ticket.

I haven’t done exit polling or convened a focus group, but I can tell you what I think about this. I think these towns are full of affluent liberals whose ideology is tempered by caution, and they voted via their pocketbooks. Janoo advocated progressive ideas including a property tax hike on second homes and a higher tax on incomes over $250,000. I know, tiny violins. But a lot of these people have household incomes north of 250 G’s and maybe own vacation property as well, and I’m sure their property taxes are in nosebleed territory. There was plenty of straight ticket Democratic voting throughout, except for Janoo. And she couldn’t win without their support.

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