Georgia Senate Runoff: Early Voting (Day 4) -- UPDATED

The data are in for Thursday's early voting across Georgia, and the trends are largely similar to what they have been across the first few days. African American participation has settled into a position just under a quarter of the early voters, but women now make up a small majority of them; gaining a slightly since the opening day was more male than female.



That provides both candidates with mixed results. Obviously, lower African American participation is detrimental to Jim Martin's chances, but women eclipsing men in early voting is an important marker for the former state rep. While the female proportion of early voters overall is lower than it was for the general election -- down from 56% -- that is a group of voters that broke for Martin over Chambliss by a 54 - 42 margin in the election day exit polls (problematic, though they are).

The bottom line here seems to be that there is a general fatigue with elections among Georgia voters. Though we've witnessed an increase in the numbers of early votes cast every successive day thus far, turnout is, simply put, way down as compared to the early voting in the Peach state from September 22 - October 31. Visits by Bill Clinton and Mike Huckabee and John McCain may yet have some effect, but it doesn't appear as if there is much of one on the early voting in the state. [Fulton County votes did go up following Clinton's visit on Wednesday, surpassing Gwinnett County as the county with the second most early votes through Thursday. Now, whether Clinton's appearance drove that is a completely different question.]

There are a couple of things I should make note of today. First, five more counties begin early voting today, leaving only four two that either haven't started or haven't reported their plans to the secretary of state's office. Secondly, I don't know SOS's plans for updating their data over the weekend. It could be that they won't update to reflect today's numbers until Monday. Then again, a few counties are open for early voting on Saturday. We may, then, get additional updates over the weekend, but I'm not sure. If there are updates, though, I'll make the proper changes here.
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Let me add in a revised map of the staggered early voting starts to reflect the fact that I tracked down when early voting for the runoff began in Towns and Treutlen Counties. The Elections Division had that information online but not on the pdf file I had been using. Towns County began on Wednesday while Treutlen started on Tuesday.

[Click Map to Enlarge]

Recent Posts:
Georgia Senate Runoff: Early Voting (Day 3)

Georgia Senate Runoff: Early Voting (Day 2)

Georgia Senate Runoff: Early Voting (Day 1)

Georgia Senate Runoff: Early Voting (Day 3)

Three days does not an election make, but the pattern emerging in the Georgia Senate runoff is looking more and more ominous for Jim Martin and better and better for Saxby Chambliss. Why? Well, as the data below clearly suggests, women and African Americans -- two groups that typically favor Democratic candidates -- are just not turning out at levels that will reverse the preference ordering from the first round on November 4. If anything, the fact that women and blacks are turning out at lower levels suggests that Chambliss will do even better on December 2 than he did earlier.



But let's parse this out a bit. The one thing that cannot be stressed enough is that early voting trends don't necessarily portend how the ultimate election outcome will look. Back before the election, I made the case that the 2008 presidential election could play out in a way similar to the 2004 election, just over an extended period of time. If you'll recall, early exit polling on election day in 2004 showed that John Kerry was ahead and likely to be the next president. But it didn't turn out that way. As the actual returns came in, the outcome was the opposite of what the early exit polls had suggested. Earlier, I argued that early voting could cause a similar effect to play out, but instead of across just election day, across the last month or so of the campaign. In other words, the early voters could be Democratic (which they were throughout much of the nation) while election day voters were more Republican. Again, it didn't turn out that way...exactly.

The argument has been made that the reports on early voting and the direction is appeared to be heading may have pushed election day turnout down. The perceived direction of the count, then, caused voters to question whether their vote was necessary in achieving their desired outcome. In the presidential election, this was more likely to affect Democrats. The most extreme example of this phenomenon was what happened in Alaska on November 4. Early voting that favored Obama and other down-ballot Democrats in the state when coupled with the 9:30pm (EST) reality in the presidential race, made it much more difficult for some Alaskans (who were getting off work around that time -- four hour time difference) to justify turning out to vote. This is part of the reason it looked -- at least on election night -- as if Ted Stevens had been reelected to his Senate seat. Those election day voters were more Republican. It wasn't until all the early votes and provisional ballots were counted that that changed.

So why am I taking this discussion to the Last Frontier and to the national level? Again, early voting may not necessarily help us to determine the ultimate outcome of the race. But here is why early voting is likely to be a fairly strong cue as to what will happen on December 2: enthusiasm. The enthusiasm that caused so many to turn out to vote early for the November 4 election doesn't seem to be there in this runoff. Now, we would expect turnout to be lower in the runoff, but it isn't proportionally lower across the various demographic groups listed in the data from the Karen Handel's office here in Georgia. It is lower among the groups that would be expected to help Jim Martin.

But couldn't we see an opposite effect from what we saw in Alaska? In other words, Republicans see that the early voting is going well for Chambliss and don't come to the polls on election day. Meanwhile Democrats, knowing they are behind, are motivated to come out to their polling places on December 2 to vote for Jim Martin.

That is possible, but it is not as likely as it would be if Georgia were not as conservatively tilted as it. If the Peach state was more competitive between the parties, then I'd be more inclined to listen to that argument. [Yes, Alaska is just as conservative as Georgia, if not more so, but it is a different kind of conservative, shaped by a completely different set of circumstances.] And this certainly works with the enthusiasm angle posited above. Georgia Republicans are on the defensive while Democrats in the state already have something they wanted out of this election: an Obama victory. Sure the talk after November 4 was that Republicans would be depressed because of what had happened cumulatively on election day, but it may be that Democrats are too elated to care instead.

An Obama appearance is still the wildcard here. But what would that signal? That he cares about the 60 seats potential in the Senate (Why, when he's going to be working across party lines anyway?) or that Martin is in danger of falling short in his effort to unseat Chambliss (Is that a good way to expend this political capital everyone is talking about?). If Obama came to Georgia to stump for Martin and Martin still lost, it likely wouldn't look good for the president-elect. And you don't want to look bad before you are even president.

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As promised, below is a map that shows the different dates on which the counties throughout Georgia started (or will start) the early voting process. Today another five counties kick off early voting with five more to follow tomorrow. The counties in light purple will have advance voting starting next Monday and those in white have yet to inform the Secretary of State's office of their plans (Of course, it is also possible that the counties have shared that information with SOS but SOS hasn't updated their online information yet.)

[Click Map to Enlarge]

That sounds like a hit on the good folks at the Secretary of State's office. It isn't one. The folks in Atlanta have been very helpful to me in putting the data I've been using the last few days together. And they have also been good about updating the early voting totals. So a heart-felt thank you is extended to them.


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Georgia Senate Runoff: Early Voting (Day 2)

Yesterday, we got our first glimpse at the early voting statistics for the Georgia Senate runoff. We also raised the question over the potential impact the staggered starts to early voting in the 159 counties across Georgia might have for the fortunes of the two candidates involved. First, let's incorporate the new data from yesterday and then I'll make some further comments on the staggered early voting starts.

[Note: I should add that early voting began in Fulton County on Tuesday and not on Wednesday as I said yesterday. In other words, there was only a one day lag for one of the most Martin-friendly counties in the Peach state. There were conflicting reports on the Fulton situation, and I opted for the AJC report, thinking it would be the most reliable. I was wrong. The Secretary of State still has a list of when early voting will take place and in which counties. But I'll have more on that in a moment.]


So, what's new?

• With Fulton added to the mix on Tuesday, the African American proportion of early voters increased, but only by a couple of percentage points. But at just under a quarter of the early votes, the African American proportion still lags almost ten points behind where it did over the course of the entire general election early voting period.
  

• Once the second day numbers are added, we also see that the female percentage of early voters increases by a modest amount. Like the African American vote, though, the percentage of women voters lags behind the overall proportion during the general election early voting.

• Also be sure to note that the spreadsheet now has tabs at the bottom for additional statistics on each of the individual days of early voting thus far.
  

The overarching message? Well, for starters, we may not want to read too much into the early voting numbers in a runoff election. [But you know I'll read into them, don't you?] Both of the demographic breakdowns above don't particularly favor Jim Martin's in his quest to reverse the general electorate's candidate preference ordering in the runoff. But let's look at the when each of Georgia's 159 counties actually started (or will start) early voting and see if the late starting counties favor one candidate over the other. First, how did the general election look on the county level? The typical red for Republicans, blue for Democrats color scheme applies.

[Click Map to Enlarge]

Now, let's remove the counties that started early voting on Monday. [I would say on or before Monday, but the two counties -- Gordon and Richmond -- that began early voting last Friday are shaded in dark gray below. However, neither is included in the analysis that follows. The same is true of the two counties -- Towns and Treutlen -- on which the the secretary of state's office still has no early voting information. They are shaded in pink on the map below. Finally, the two counties in light bluish gray -- Madison and McIntosh -- are counties where there is no early voting. Advance voting will start on Monday in both areas. Both Madison and McIntosh are included in our analysis.]

[Click Map to Enlarge]

What can be gleaned from that map? At first glance, not much. Just eyeballing the red and blue counties -- those counties that started early voting after Monday -- doesn't really turn up any noticeable trends. Once we combine the information from both maps, though, we start to get a clearer picture of whether one of the candidates benefits from the staggered starts to early voting. On November 4, Saxby Chambliss won 121 of Georgia's 159 counties. Of those 121, 45 counties started their early voting operations after November 17. Jim Martin, on the other hand, won 38 counties on election day and 18 of those had late starts to early voting.

Yeah, but Georgia isn't under the county unit system anymore, is it? So the county counting is irrelevant. That's true, so let's look at the proportion of the November 4 vote total from each of those collections of counties. I've removed Allen Buckley's vote total, and as a result, I'm just looking at the share of the two-party vote each candidate's late-start early voting counties comprises. [Yeah, I agree. "Late-start early voting counties" is confusing.] Basically, the result is a wash. The 45 Chambliss counties that began (or will begin) early voting after Monday made up 12.3% of the two-party vote on November 4, while the 18 Martin counties (including Fulton) that got off to a late start in early voting accounted for 11.77% of the total two-party vote during the general election. If anything, then, Chambliss is at an ever so slight disadvantage due to the staggered start to early voting in counties across the Peach state. Again though, it isn't by much. And with the proportion of early African American and female voters down from where they were during the general election's early voting period, it may not matter anyway. That drop likely outweighs any disadvantage Chambliss may be getting because counties he won on November 4 are off to a late start in early voting.

Let me note again today that I'll be updating this data daily and that I'm still trying to track down the day-by-day data for the general election's early voting period. That information will help to a more informed projection of the runoff vote. Also, tomorrow I'll add in a map to reflect the different start dates for each county's early voting windows.


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Georgia Senate Runoff: Early Voting (Day 1)

Below are the numbers from the first day of early voting in the Georgia Senate runoff:


Now, you can also get this data from the Georgia Secretary of State's web site, but I've augmented the numbers to include the percentages and the totals by gender and race.

So, what do we know after one day of voting in the Peach state?

• Turnout is down, but that's not a surprise. Barely 13,000 votes cast is a fraction of what we were seeing early on in the general election early voting. [I'm still trying to get a hold of the day-by-day data on this in order to draw a proper comparison.]
• The percentage of African American participation is down. This isn't a fair comparison, but over the entire early voting period for the general election, blacks made up nearly 35% of early voters (via Michael McDonald). For that proportion to sink to 22% is not good news for Jim Martin.
• The female percentage of the early vote is also down; another possible omen for Martin. Again, according to McDonald, women made up over 56% of early voters prior to the November 4 election. That proportion is now down to just under 48%.

Alright, now that we've got the numbers out of the way let's add in the caveats.

• Monday, the only day reflected in these numbers, was only the first day of early voting in some counties throughout Georgia.
• African American-heavy counties, like Fulton, don't start until Wednesday. You'll notice that the spreadsheet doesn't have Fulton among the top five counties for early voting. Fulton was the number two county overall for early voting ahead of the general election. So pack up those doomsday scenarios for Martin for the time being.
• I spoke with someone at the Elections Division at the Secretary of State's office today and was told that some counties would not be offering early voting at all. What!?! They instead are offering only advance voting. The difference is that there are more locations for advance voting but over a shorter period of time.

All this staggered starting to the early voting brings up an interesting question: What impact will it have? I took a lot of flak in the comments section last week for giving the general election's county results in the Senate race an electoral college treatment. In light of these differing windows of early voting, though, it really could have an impact on turnout. In other words, if the counties that have early voting the longest are Chambliss counties, the the Republican incumbent could potentially bank some votes in a way similar to what Obama did nationwide in the presidential race.

The complicating factor is that a county like Fulton will only have the final three business days of this week and the first three business days of next week -- truncated due to the Thanksgiving holiday -- for early voting. And those advance voting-only counties will only have the three days next week. Again, if those are predominantly Martin counties, then the challenger may be getting the short end of the stick. And to think, there was all this fuss over the Republicans having lengthened the time between the general election and the runoff when they reinstituted the 50% rule for the runoff. The talk over the last week or so here in Georgia was that the extra week would give enthusiastic Democrats even more time to vote. Well, not if they can't. So, the 50% rule hurt Chambliss, but the time between the general and the runoff may not.

I'm going to be augmenting this daily (Well, week-daily as there won't be any new data on the weekends.) as we approach election day on December 2. I'll add in the new data each day and share that with everyone, but I also hope to, as I said, get a hold of some other data in order to potentially make some projections. Stay tuned.


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Hillary Clinton vs. John McCain

I spent a lot of time last week looking at the county-level 2008 v. 2004 map that The New York Times was running online (see below). It really is a fascinating feature, but if you've been around here long enough, this doesn't really come as any surprise. I like maps. [Incidentally, you can now compare 2008 to the past presidential elections back to 1992. Just click on "Voting Shifts."]

[Click Map to Enlarge]

Anyway, the more I looked at it, the more it looked like something I had remembered seeing somewhere before. In fact, it was right here at FHQ. One of the things that the early days of this election year allowed us was this wonderful three month period after John McCain had wrapped up the Republican nomination, but in which Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were still actively competing for the Democratic nomination. The polling that was released during that period produced what FHQ liked to call the McCain margin.* The formula was simple: Subtract Hillary Clinton's margin against John McCain in head-to-head trial heat polls in each state from the similar margin between Obama and McCain.

[Click Map to Enlarge]

Above is the final McCain Margin map from June 3; the day of the final primaries in Montana and South Dakota. Now what you see isn't anything groundbreaking, but the areas in green (those where Clinton was doing better against McCain than Obama was) overlap to a large degree with the Times map above. It is that same swath of land from Oklahoma eastward and north into Appalachia. Now, Massachusetts and New York would have given their votes to either Democrat, and neither ever seemed terribly viable in those Appalachian states, but at the time Florida, Missouri and Pennsylvania lent some validity to that Clinton campaign argument that the New York senator would fare better in the electoral college against John McCain than would her senate colleague from Illinois. As it turned out, Obama won two of those three anyway.

While things changed for Barack Obama after the economic crisis hit (and even before that, for that matter), the same areas that vexed him during the primaries, ended up going against him on November 4. But they would have gone against either Democrat, right? Well, I'm not so sure Hillary Clinton (and by extension Bill Clinton) wouldn't have made things interesting in Arkansas, Tennessee and West Virginia. I could see a scenario where she exchanged the 16 electoral votes from North Carolina and Nebraska's 2nd district for the 22 from the three states above. That could have drastically recolored that Times map (...with North Carolina being much lighter blue and Arkansas, Tennessee and West Virginia turning blue in the process.).

That would have given Clinton 371 electoral votes (to McCain's 167). Where else would Clinton have potentially been more successful? More vulnerable?


*In 2012 the McCain Margin will be redubbed the Obama Margin because, unless Obama fails over the course of the next four years, the president-elect will run unopposed for the Democratic nomination. Translation: we get to compare the various Republican candidates against how they are doing versus President Obama in each of the states. And we probably won't have to wait until 2012. There will likely be some state level polling done in some of the more competitive states in 2011. [And I'm sure we'll start seeing national level trial heats as soon as the 2010 midterm elections are complete.]


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Since yesterday, when I saw it five or six times during regional football coverage, I've been trying to track down the latest ad from Saxby Chambliss. Essentially the ad is a remix of the ad "Martin Economics" that ran during the last week or so of the general election campaign (see below). The basic point? Obama's (...and by extension Martin's) tax plan(s) is (are) bad for Georgians. The new version ends with Chambliss promising to lower taxes.



But Chambliss is not alone here. In fact, the DSCC has been quite involved in this campaign over the final weeks of the general election campaign. But Martin, too, has an addition to the discussion as well.



The ad, "Recession," may as well be called, "In His Own Words." It opens, as you can see above, with Chambliss saying, "We may not be in a recession. I don't know what that term means." Yeah, that one is in the same vein as "Read My Lips" and "The Fundamentals of the Economy are Strong." And the intent is exactly the same: Paint your opponent as out of touch on the most salient issue of the 2008 campaign. 61% of voters polled (...in the exit polls) called the economy the "most important issue" and 49% of those went for Martin compared to 47% for Chambliss. That's a pretty even division, and tells us why both are continuing to revisit the issue in ads. If anyone can claim any advantage on the issue before December 2, it could make the difference.

And for the record, the footage of Chambliss in that new Martin ad is from this cycle. Yeah, the topic is timely enough, but still. Those are current Chambliss signs in the background, though.

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UPDATE
Oh, and here is the latest ad from the NRSC on behalf of Chambliss. There's some good imagery in this one. Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer make appearances at the end with Martin's "crazy" picture being blocked out by the words "Liberal Jim Martin" with Pelosi prominently displayed to the right. The "Out of Touch" charge on the economy is the issue of this runoff. Both candidates are saying the other is more out of touch on the economic situation.




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Reform: First Up? The Texas Primary-Caucus System

Sure the election just ended but why not strike while the iron is hot, right? Well, that's what Texas Democrats are doing. After the Lone Star state's primary handed Hillary Clinton an important comeback victory on March 4 to go with the New York senator's wins in Ohio and Rhode Island, the caucus portion of Texas' delegate selection process favored Obama. And even though the caucus accounted for roughly one-third of the delegates, Obama's edge in that side of the contest gave him enough of a delegate lead to take the state overall.

But some people didn't like that and the Texas Democratic Party is reviewing the process, which on Friday meant the party hearing from members about the primary-caucus system. Here's a report from an Austin-area TV station:


The thing that gets me (Well, other than the claim that the legislature is required to make a change to the system.*) is that it really won't matter for Texas Democrats in 2012. Unless the Obama administration is a complete failure, there will not be a contested primary on the Democratic side in any state, much less Texas. But as I said when I led this post off, why not strike while the iron is hot? If the party, or any of its members, wait to change the way delegates are allocated in the Democratic nomination races in the election years ahead, it's best to do it when there is some controversy to help grease the wheels. This particular delegate allocation system does seem like a relic of the transition from a primary to a caucus in Texas, but unlike most other states that have switched, Texas has let this play out for almost 30 years by not dropping the caucus altogether. I would assume that most of that is due to the fact that other than in 1988, Texas just wasn't a big player in deciding either nomination. And what that meant was that some of the rules that are only now being scrutinized weren't being looked at at all.

For more on the Texas system, have a look back at our run through Texas during the 2008 cycle.

*The claim on both the report and the blog post I got this news from (h/t, by the way to Change the Caucus) that a change to the system requires action on the part of the Texas state legislature is news to me. Unless there is a new rule that I haven't been let in on, it is up to the state party, not the state legislature to decide the method by which delegates are allocated. In most primary states the state parties typically go along with the state-funded contest -- the one put in place by the state government -- and this isn't really an issue with the caucus. But that doesn't match up with the reporting on this. The Republicans in Texas, for instance, don't have a caucus like the Democrats do, just the primary. If the GOP in the state wanted to add one they wouldn't need approval from the state legislature unless that state was paying the bill. They aren't. The nightcap caucus is something the Democratic Party pays for and is thus in no way beholden to the Texas state legislature in any way.

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Thanks to Anon4:25 for pointing out a necessary clarification to this post in the comments section below. I certainly painted this caucus issue in black and white terms but didn't account for the gray area in between. In the scenario posited by Anon., it isn't the caucus that's at stake, but rather the proportion of delegates that that portion of the process receives.

And that raises a good question for the comments section: What is a good or proper balance between the primary and caucus if the caucus is kept?

In 2008, the caucus delegates made up just over one-third of the total "pledged" delegates. How far should that be dropped? A quarter? A tenth? Another way or asking this is to ask whether the impact of the caucus is diminished to the point that the party-building and local organizing that CBSmith mentions isn't possible because there isn't a significant enough motivation to participate? Or is that what the state party wants?


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There will be a runoff between Saxby Chambliss and Jim Martin. [Now, there's a shock!]

Early voting for the December 2 runoff will start as early as Monday (November 17) in some counties and no later than Wednesday (November 19) according to Secretary of State Karen Handel's press release yesterday.

One other interesting fact about the rules behind the runoff system in Georgia is that when the 50% plus one vote threshold was reapplied to statewide races in 2005, the interim period between the general election and the runoff election was expanded from three weeks to four weeks. I suspect that is due in large part to the potential for overlap with the Thanksgiving holiday, but I can't verify that. One thing is for sure, the advance voting week will fall during Thanksgiving week and has been condensed from five days to just three as a result.

What's the difference between early and advance voting, you ask? Well, in Georgia it seems to boil down to a matter of the number of voting locations. Early voting is confined to one location per county but over an extended period of time (September 22-October 31 for the November 4 election), whereas advance voting has a greater number of polling places in the larger counties during just the business week (Monday -Friday) prior to the election.

Some of Jim Martin's success in the general election was dependent upon early and advance voting and that was driven in large part by the efforts of the Obama campaign to get out the (early) vote in Georgia. We have talked about Obama as a wildcard in this runoff race, but whether he appears in Georgia between now and December 2 -- John McCain and Mike Huckabee have already lined up stops to campaign for Chambliss -- may not matter as much as the remnants of the Obama campaign's infrastructure in Georgia (and from workers pouring into the state from other locales) banking those early votes for Martin as they did for Obama prior to November 4.

Question for the comments section: What impact might that extra week between elections have on the outcome? I can see it going both ways: the enthusiasm behind Martin dies down or another unintended consequence of the GOP-driven law change -- more time for Martin to mobilize -- coming back to haunt them. Thoughts?


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A Check on Frontloading from the Courts?

Now here is an interesting twist to the Florida primary debacle of 2008 and it has implication for the future of frontloading.

The Case: Ausman v. Browning

The Argument: The Florida legislature violated the national Democratic Party's right to free speech when the legislature set the Sunshine state's primary for January 29, 2008. In other words, the national party was unable to choose its nominee in Florida according to the Florida Delegate Selection plan approved by the Rules and Bylaws Committee. [Yeah, remember them?]

This is fairly significant (...whether it is getting much press or not). If there is one thing we know about the courts' involvement in these sorts of disputes, it is that they typically side with the parties. A recent example of this was when the within-casino caucus sites were challenged by the Clinton campaign before the Nevada caucuses last January. The courts yielded to the parties (and the pre-approved delegate selection plan) in that instance.

One byproduct of the plaintiff winning this case (...and any subsequent appeals) is that, if anything, states, and the actors setting the date on which their delegate selection event is held within them, would seemingly have to adhere to the delegate selection plans that are usually due in to the national party by the end of the summer before a new election cycle begins. For 2008, both national parties had September deadlines. In Florida and Michigan in 2008, those plans were violated when their legislatures shifted up their primary contests.

The bottom line is that the national parties would gain a bit more power in this process based on the approval power they would (and do, for that matter) hold over states' delegate selection plans. So, if the courts validate these plans from each state, they essentially become something similar to a binding contract on allocating delegates. And the date on which a primary or caucus is held is a vital component of those plans.

Does that prevent rogue states from popping up? No, but it does give the national party some potential legal standing to challenge them in court if it were to come to that. This case reaches "one to watch " status here at FHQ.


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A Projected 2012 Electoral College Map (version 1.0)

For a look at the 2012-2020 electoral college map based on the 2010 Census click here. And for look at how those changes would have affected the 2008 presidential election click here.

There is no shortage of projections on how the 435 House seats will be reapportioned following the 2010 Census and like anything else, they range from modest changes to volatile, far-reaching changes. [And you can also see Nate Silver's attempts to update the 2007 projections -- the basis of both the linked projections above -- here.] What's funny is that both the links cite the same source, Election Data Services, yet describe very different projections. Well, the CQ article cites EDS while The Washington Times uses a combination of the EDS projections and those from Polidata. The Polidata end seems to be adding all the volatility. As such, I'm going to lean on the more conservative EDS projection (Silver's is in between but closer to EDS.).

[Alright, get to the point. How's the map going to look in four years?]

Well, here you go, complete with map and seat gains/losses:

[Click Map to Enlarge]

I jokingly ended the electoral college map slideshow with a blank map that had the election date of the 2012 election on it. But that one wasn't accurate; it didn't reflect the changes due to reapportionment that will happen between now and 2012. So what do we know about the changes? As all the articles that discuss the upcoming apportionment typically say, the South and southwest gain while the Rust Belt and into the northeast states continue to lose seats. But a blank map isn't really telling you a whole lot, is it? How about a real world application?

What would the McCain-Obama contest have looked like if this projected 2012 map was used instead? [Well, I made that one too.]

[Click Map to Enlarge]

McCain would gain three electoral votes on Obama and that is it. For the record, the Polidata projection, wacky as it is, would only yield McCain a few additional electoral votes. In a year that tilts toward the Democrats, those changes are manageable, but in a year with conditions triggering a more competitive contest, those changes might help the GOP. Then again, if the changes in Colorado and Nevada are lasting, Indiana, North Carolina and Virginia remain competitive, and Arizona and Georgia continue to trend toward the Democratic Party, they may benefit the Democrats.

UPDATE: One other way we can look at the changes more in-depth is to examine how that six electoral vote shift toward McCain in the projected 2012 apportionment changes the outlook on the Electoral College Spectrum. So, we can see how/if the campaigns' target states would have shifted if the map was different.

In September 2008, there was a time when Colorado or New Hampshire would have put Obama or McCain over the top in the electoral college. If Obama had won all the states favoring him up to and including Colorado the president-elect would have netted 269 electoral votes. The same was true of John McCain in terms of New Hampshire. Obama would have needed New Hampshire and McCain would have needed Colorado to cross the 270 electoral vote threshold. But Colorado eventually swapped positions with New Hampshire and moved into sole possession of the "victory line" distinction. To win Colorado, then, meant that the winner was the victor in the presidential race (...if they won the other states ranked behind the Centennial state).

Would that have been the case, though, if the 2012 map were in place for this past election?

The Electoral College Spectrum*
HI-4 (7)**	ME-4 (155)	NM-5 (260)	ND-3 (377/164)	AK-3 (62)
VT-3 (10)	OR-7 (162)	CO-9*** (269/278)	GA-16 (161)	KY-8 (59)
DE-3 (13)	WA-11 (173)	VA-13*** (282/269)	WV-5 (145)	TN-11 (51)
NY-30 (43)	NJ-15 (188)	NV-6 (288/256)	AZ-11 (140)	KS-6 (40)
IL-21 (64)	IA-6 (194)	OH-19 (307/250)	SD-3 (129)	NE-5 (34)
MD-10 (74)	WI-10 (204)	FL-28 (335/231)	LA-8 (126)	AL-9 (29)
RI-4 (78)	MN-10 (214)	NC-15 (350/203)	AR-6 (118)	WY-3 (120)
MA-11 (89)	PA-20 (234)	MO-10 (360/188)	TX-36 (112)	ID-4 (17)
CA-55 (144)	MI-17 (251)	IN-11 (371/178)	MS-6 (76)	UT-6 (13)
CT-7 (151)	NH-4 (255)	MT-3 (374/167)	SC-8 (70)	OK-7 (7)
*Follow the link for a detailed explanation on how to read the Electoral College Spectrum. **The numbers in the parentheses refer to the number of electoral votes a candidate would have if he won all the states ranked prior to that state. If, for example, McCain won all the states up to and including Colorado (all Obama's toss up states plus Colorado), he would have 274 electoral votes. Both candidates numbers are only totaled through their rival's toss up states. In those cases, Obama's number is on the left and McCain's is on the right in italics. ***The point between Colorado and Virginia is where Obama crosses (or McCain would cross) the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidential election. Obama would need Virginia and McCain would have needed Colorado to have surpassed that barrier. That line is referred to as the victory line. Under the actual 2008 electoral college distribution, Colorado was the state that each candidate needed to cross 270.

Well, no. That reapportionment-triggered shift toward McCain would have brought Virginia into the mix on the cycle's final Electoral College Spectrum. As was the case in the Colorado/New Hampshire situation, no one state would have been the Victory Line state. Instead, the possibility of an electoral college tie would have been put on the table. Both Virginia and Colorado would have to be won fo either of the candidates to pass the 270 electoral vote barrier. Of course, Obama won and held a six state cushion beyond that, but if the race had been, say, five or six points closer, Virginia would have been in play and the likelihood of an electoral college tie would have increased substantially.


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