Surry County voters, by a margin of just 25 votes, backed former President Donald Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris, marking the first time in 52 years that the rural, but traditionally Democratic-leaning county of roughly 6,500 residents has preferred a Republican presidential candidate.

According to complete but unofficial results the Virginia Department of Elections released shortly before 11 p.m. on Nov. 5, Trump carried Surry with 2,175 votes, or 49.6%, to Harris’ 2,150, or 49%.

Out of the remaining 59 votes, accounting for 1.3% of Surry’s 4,384 total ballots, 15 went to Green Party candidate Jill Stein, 14 went to Libertarian candidate Chase Oliver, nine went to independent candidate Claudia De la Cruz, another nine went to independent candidate Cornel West and 12 went to write-in candidates.

Despite this, 2,203, or 52.4%, of Surry voters backed Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va.’s, reelection bid over Republican challenger Hung Cao, who received a 2,072 or just under 48.4% share of Surry’s votes, with nine write-ins accounting for the remaining 0.2%.

Surry voters also backed U.S. Rep. Jennifer McClellan, D-Va., with 2,149, or 50.4%, over Republican challenger William “Bill” Moher, who received 2,103, or just under 49.4% of the county’s votes.

McClellan received 240,014 votes, or just under 66.9%, to Moher’s 118,189, or 32.9%, across the 4th Congressional District, which spans four cities and 11 counties from Richmond to the North Carolina border, including Surry. The remaining 760 districtwide votes, accounting for 0.2%, went to write-in candidates.

According to Department of Elections records, Surry has voted Democratic in every presidential election since 1980 when 1,829 Surry residents backed former President Jimmy Carter over the 929 who voted for then-incumbent Republican President Gerald Ford. The last time a majority of Surry residents voted for a Republican presidential candidate was 1972, when 1,067 Surry voters backed Richard Nixon.

The blue-to-red shift has mirrored a decades-long change in Surry’s demographics.

In 2016 when 2,272 Surry voters backed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton over the 1,819 who’d voted for Trump, the county’s populace was roughly 43% Black and 54% white, according to past reporting by The Smithfield Times.

According to census data, Surry’s Black population had declined to 38%, and its white population had grown to 58%, in 2020 when the county saw 2,397 of its voters back President Joe Biden over the 2,025 who voted for Trump that year.

In 1980, by comparison, Surry had a population of just over 6,046 residents, 62.5% of whom identified as Black.

While intra-census population estimates as of 2023 don’t include an updated racial breakdown, an analysis of Surry County Public Schools’ enrollment suggests the demographic shift has persisted since 2020.

During the 2018-19 school year, white students accounted for 36% of the school division’s enrollment, according to Virginia Department of Education data. By the 2023-24 school year, that percentage had increased to 43.4%.