Alabama may have a Democrat in the United States Senate, but don’t kid yourself - it’s among the most conservative states in the country.

On average, 58 percent of all votes cast in Alabama’s last three statewide elections went for Republicans. The majority of Alabama’s counties are firmly red. And those that aren’t tend to be deep blue. But there are a handful of notable exceptions, counties where the vote is almost evenly split, and near the top of that list are three of the state’s larger metros, Mobile, Tuscaloosa and Huntsville.

AL.com analyzed data from the Alabama Secretary of State’s office for the 2016 Presidential election, the 2017 special Senate election and the 2018 governor’s race, along with population data from the U.S. Census Bureau to determine where voters are most likely to vote Republican vs. Democrat - and where they are a tad less predictable.

No two counties have been more bipartisan over the last few years than Conecuh and Barbour.

Neither party has earned a majority of the total votes cast in those two counties over the last three statewide elections. Democrats in both counties hold a narrow lead over that time, with exactly 49.89 percent of the total vote in both counties.

Both Counties also flipped between elections, voting for President Donald Trump in 2016, then flipping to Democratic Sen. Doug Jones in 2017, and finally back to Republican Kay Ivey in the 2018 governor’s race.

In Conecuh County, home of the famous sausage, the margin separating Democrats from Republicans during those elections was just 75 votes.

Two bands cross the state, one north and one south of Birmingham, that highlight the strongest areas of Republican and Democratic support in Alabama. | Graphic by Ramsey Archibald

But those counties are both small - Barbour has just over 20,000 voting-age people, while Conecuh has fewer than 10,000.

There are three seemingly split counties with much larger voting totals.

Mobile County, the second largest in the state, trails just behind Conecuh and Barbour. In those three elections, Republicans have scored just less than 51 percent of the vote, compared to Democrats’ 47.6 percent - a 3-point spread.

Tuscaloosa County, home to the University of Alabama, also wavers between parties. Republicans there held a 3.5 percentage point lead over the last three elections.

Next was Madison County, home of Huntsville and the third largest county in Alabama.

Conecuh Sausage doesn't have a party. Or, at least, the county doesn't seem to. | Graphic by Ramsey Archibald

Jefferson County, the largest county in the state and home to Birmingham, along with a handful of counties stretching through the south-central part of the state - known as the Black Belt, have been firmly blue. Jefferson has the largest Democratic vote total of any county, with more than 450,000 votes cast for Democrats over that time - which equates to about 58.6 percent of the total votes.

But the bluest county in terms of percentage is Greene County, in the Black Belt, where 85 percent of all votes cast in statewide elections since 2016 have gone for Democrats. Greene is the smallest county in Alabama, with just 6,500 people 18 years old or older.

Meanwhile, a stretch of counties north of Birmingham tend to be the most conservative in the state. In Blount County, directly northeast of Jefferson, Republicans have earned nearly 87 percent of all votes cast during the last three elections - the highest percentage in the state.

Do you have an idea for a data story about Alabama? Email Ramsey Archibald at rarchibald@al.com, and follow him on Twitter @RamseyArchibald. Read more Alabama data stories here.