The Argument Did the Opioid Epidemic Help Republicans Win?
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Feb 2, 2026 Carolina Arteaga, assistant economics professor at the University of Toronto who studies the opioid epidemic's economic and political effects. She discusses research linking opioid exposure to rising Republican vote share. They cover Purdue’s marketing, how local media framed the crisis as crime not health, population and fertility shifts, and whether migration or persuasion drove political change.
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Cumulative Social Harms Drove Voting Change
- The epidemic produced a cascade: more prescriptions, overdoses, disability, poverty, then political shifts.
- Those economic and social harms accumulated and translated into higher Republican vote share by the 2010s.
Robustness Tests Strengthen Causal Claim
- Arteaga rules out alternative regional or trade-shock explanations through robustness tests.
- The opioid effect persists after controlling for Appalachia, Rust Belt, NAFTA and China exposure variables.
Partisan Local Coverage Mattered
- Conservative-leaning local newspapers covered opioid stories more and in closer relation to local harm.
- Democratic-leaning papers covered the national angle more and less often tied coverage to local impact.