A Colorado reader digests the latest early-voting numbers:
Dems had better get a huge turnout advantage on election day. If the election were based on the votes through yesterday afternoon, they would need to carry Independents by 65-35 to make up the difference (now, I realize that some GOP voters will go Dem, and Dem voters will go GOP, so this might not be completely accurate, but it’s close).
To put this in perspective, according to the SoS numbers as of the end of October, here is what voter registration looks like:
Total: 2,986,362
GOP 966,082 (32.3%)
Dem: 913,246 (30.5%)
So, 49 percent of registered voters have already voted. When pundits project 2.1M voters in Colorado, that would mean 70.3 percent turnout. That seems awfully high in a non-presidential year. So, yesterday I said that perhaps 2/3 have already voted, but it may be higher than that.
Interjection from Jim: This is the first year Colorado has used vote-by-mail, so we should expect turnout to be significantly higher than in past cycles. Oregon enjoyed turnout of 70 percent (2006) to 86 percent (2004) in its elections.
GOP turnout percentage is +8.1 points, while Dem turnout is +1.6 points.
GOP has turned out 61.1% of its registered voters, Dems have turned out 51.5%, while Others is much lower, at 36.4%. So, could we be looking at an election where (i) both the GOP and Dems do pretty well with turnout of their respective voters, (ii) GOP does better by 5-10 points (in % of RVs turned out) because the GOP is more motivated (we’ve seen numbers in this range in polling of voter enthusiasm), and (iii) the Independents don’t turn out at nearly the same rate, and their turnout is much more in line with what one would expect for a mid-term election, or at a time when neither party is terribly well liked?
One figure working for the Republicans in Colorado: “Mail ballots have to arrive by 7:00 on election night. It doesn’t matter when they’re post-marked.” In some other states, such as Iowa, ballots will be accepted in the days after the election if they were postmarked one day before the election.
Colorado also permits residents to register to vote today and cast legal ballots.