Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA · how this place’s counties split between candidates in each party’s presidential nominating contest, cycle by cycle. A primary is a contest inside one party, so it has no Democratic–Republican margin and is not part of the general-election record above.
Akashic reports votes cast, not delegates awarded. The two can disagree: Clinton led the 2008 national primary popular vote by less than half a point and did not win the nomination.
Primary returns are published at county grain and there is no roll-up above it. Each cell counts how many of this place’s counties a candidate led — a count of records, not a vote total. Who led the place as a whole is not knowable from these returns, because county rows carry a leader and a lead but no per-candidate votes.
Presidential nominating contests in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, by party and cycle.
○no contest record — Akashic holds no result for that party and cycle here. It is not a claim that no contest was held. Telling apart a contest that was cancelled, one that went uncontested, and one simply not yet ingested needs a nominating-contest calendar, which is a separate ingest from results and does not exist yet.
Republican presidential primaries are not yet ingested — the Republican series runs from 1856 and is in scope. The row is kept so its absence is visible: a Democratic-only panel would otherwise read as though no one else held a contest.
Akashic carries 10 states for 2012 and 3 states for 2024. Cycles in which an incumbent president seeks renomination are thin by nature — few states run a contested primary — so a sparse column is politics, not a hole in the record.
County returns carry a leader and a lead over the runner-up, and nothing more. The full candidate field with vote shares is published at state grain — follow a cycle above to the state contest for it.
voter registration
Registered voters
By party of registration, over time
Party registration · 2024D+1.9
vs
Presidential vote · 2024R+6.5
Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA registers Democratic but votes Republican — a 8.3-point gap between how voters register and how they vote, the signature of ancestral registration that trails realignment.
DemocraticRepublicanUnaffiliatedOther parties
Voter registration in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA
Year
Total registered
Democratic
Republican
Unaffiliated
Other
2008
113,988
38,514
30,632
44,782
60
2010
115,614
38,386
31,597
45,506
125
2012
117,963
38,255
32,351
47,175
182
2014
116,329
37,342
31,440
47,158
389
2016
115,918
38,472
32,907
43,827
712
2018
115,695
38,286
31,949
44,398
1,062
2020
117,286
42,429
34,581
39,304
972
2022
114,558
39,539
34,046
40,011
962
2024
114,134
36,993
34,874
41,184
1,083
domestic migration
Who moves in and out
Net domestic migration over time
−612 net domestic migration · 2025
20112025
Net −9,297 over 2011–2025 · gain loss
Domestic migration in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA: net domestic migration by year
Year
Net domestic migration
2011
−285
2012
−358
2013
+71
2014
−405
2015
−544
2016
−1,695
2017
−1,502
2018
−1,156
2019
−1,110
2021
−637
2022
−980
2023
+66
2024
−150
2025
−612
Anchored by Waterloo and Cedar Falls, this metro pairs a historically union-heavy industrial core with a college-town precincts around the University of Northern Iowa, producing persistent intra-metro splits that have made it a genuine swing bellwether in statewide races.
Across the recorded series it reached a Democratic high of 21.5 points in 1912 and a Republican high of 63.9 points in 1920. Between 2020 and 2024 the metro moved 7.5 points toward the Republican candidate; the 2024 margin was 6.5 points.
A population of 168,637, a 82% non-Hispanic-white share, and a median household income of $70,988 describe the metro. The metro's voting pattern over the last decade is most similar to that of Cedar Rapids, IA and Davenport-Moline-Rock Island, IA-IL.
Akashic
Political twins — metros
The metros whose fingerprint — 2000–2024 trajectory, demographics, ancestry, religion — sits closest to this one, and why.
Twin score (0–100) = weighted cosine between tier-standardized fingerprints: presidential margins 2000–2024 with 12-yr trend and elasticity, ACS income, age, education, population and race, top reported ancestries, and religious adherence — chips name the closest-shared dimensions and the widest gap. Re-weight the groups in the twins explorer.
Compare two places, side by side
Twelve curated comparisons line up election history, demographics, and the divergence story for two places at a glance. Browse all comparisons →
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All citations released under CC BY 4.0. Attribution: Akashic Intelligence.
Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa. Akashic. https://akashic.app/cbsa/47940/. Accessed May 20, 2026. License: CC BY 4.0.
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How did Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa vote in 2024?
In 2024, Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa voted Republican by 6.5 points (R+6.5), carried by the Republican candidate. Out of 84,659 votes cast, 38,889 went Democratic and 44,369 went Republican.
When did Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa last vote Democratic?
The most recent presidential election in which Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa voted Democratic was 2020.
How many people live in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa?
Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa has a population of 168,637 according to the 2024 American Community Survey 5-year estimates from the US Census Bureau.
What is the median household income in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa?
Median household income in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa is $70,988 — below the national median of $80,734. The Iowa state median is $75,059.
What is the political history of Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa?
Akashic tracks 34 presidential elections in Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA, Iowa from 1892 to 2024. Of those, 13 went Democratic and 20 went Republican.
