North Carolina Voter Registration Data as of 8-8-15

Just posted some data on Twitter and am posting here from the August 8, 2015 data from NC State Board of Elections:

NC donors favor GOP super PACs over candidates

Jim Morrill of the Charlotte Observer has an article about the flood of money from NC going into super PACs rather than the GOP candidates, and that supports a lot of stories about the role of money in this year's presidential primary season and the fact that super PACs are dominating.

Some thoughts on the GOP Presidential Debate

Now that the dust has settled after the GOP Presidential Debate, some thoughts on how each candidate did and what the debate may do to the race, via my other blog at WFAE, The Party Line.

Political Round-Up on WUNC's "The State of Things"

I had the opportunity to join Ken Rudin with host Frank Stasio on WUNC's noon show, "The State of Things," talking about the GOP debate and the retirement of Jon Stewart.

Talking about NC Budget Politics this morning and then news this afternoon

Was pleased to be on WFAE's Charlotte Talks about the NC budget politics; then, in the same day, Senate Republicans have come up with a compromise to get talks moving.

NC Secretary of Health & Human Services Resigns

Some comments on the second major resignation from the McCrory administration in a week.

Generational Dynamics Reveal 2016's Potential Shift in North Carolina's Electorate

In a recent Pew Research report, Millennials (those born in 1981 up to the beginning of the new millennium) will overtake Baby Boomers (those born from 1945 to 1965, generally) as the nation’s largest living generation.  And, to quote a famous line drummed into history about the baby boomers, the torch is finally being passed to a new generation.

There is no doubt that the Millennials’ rise, as a techno-savvy, diverse, and highly educated generation, will impact the nation in a variety of ways, most notably through its politics. Some doubt the real impact of Millennials, however; Philip Bump, writing for the Washington Post’s Wonkblog, says that Millennials won’t matter very much in American politics until they get older. 

But in North Carolina, at least, the impact of the Millennial generation is being felt in the pool of potential voters, but not in the composition of voters casting ballots—at least, not yet.

In the database of registered North Carolina voters from the NC State Board of Elections and matching up records of those who cast ballots with their basic demographic information, the most interesting trend since 2000 has been the growing percentage of Millennials in the registered voter pool.

Since the beginning of the 21^st Century, North Carolina voters in the Millennial generation have gone from 2 percent of the registered voter pool to 26 percent in 2014, while Baby Boomers have seen their proportion of the pool shrink from 45 percent down to 32 percent over the same time period.

The past trends suggest that between presidential elections in North Carolina, the percentage of the pool of registered Millennial voters increases 8 percent, with the percentage of the pool increasing 2 percent between presidential and mid-term election years. If these trends hold, then Millennial registered voters will go from 24 percent in 2012 to 32 percent in 2016, matching that year’s likely proportion of Baby Boomers in the state's eligible voter pool.

With nearly a third of the registered voters and many of them maturing into political participation, Millennials will begin to impact the state’s politics; and, in fact, they already are. 

Among Millennial voters, as of the end of 2014, 37 percent are registered Democrats, 37 percent are registered unaffiliated, and only a quarter of Millennial voters are registered Republican.  This may be one of the early demographic warning signs that some Republicans have been concerned about.

But as Bump noted, in the past two presidential and mid-term elections, Millennials have not shown up at comparable levels to their registration percentages.

In both the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections, 68 percent and 55 percent of Millennials cast ballots; however, in comparison, all other generations had higher percentages showing up, with Baby Boomers at 84 percent and 78 percent in 2008 and 2012, respectively. 

With the lower turnout rates, Millennials were only 13 and 19 percent in the 2008 and 2012 electorates, respectively, while Baby Boomers were 39 and 43 percent of the presidential elections.  This isn’t unheard of, since younger voters, no matter the generation, typically do not show up at the ballot box until they hold steady jobs, have families, and are more grounded in the economic and political system.

So while the Millennial generation’s overall numbers are signaling the critical shift in voter registration, that is the first sign of their growing level of importance. Whether one party, or both, recognizes the future wave of Millennials coming through the political system and respond will be the key test to see how much their generation begins to shape not just North Carolina, but the nation as a whole.

Some thoughts going into Election Evening

Here are some random thoughts on the US and NC elections prior to the polls closing at 7:30 (in the Old North State).

1. NC's US Senate Race could be a nail-bitter throughout the night.

The term 'constantly consistent' could be used to describe how the contest between Kay Hagan and Thom Tillis has been since the early summer.  The polls leading up to today have shown a race within the bounds of margins of error:

Based on the mid-term election fundamentals in North Carolina, this should be (by all accounts) a lean-GOP seat this year, but I think the level of polarization and competitiveness that North Carolina experiences in presidential years has bled over into mid-term years (more on both the lean-GOP and competitiveness in a moment).

The result is that most predictions are for a pure toss-up among those analysts (Charlie Cook, Stu Rothenberg) who use a variety of quantitative and qualitative measures, while the 'modeling' folks (538, Washington Post, HuffPost) are more likely to show a lean-Hagan tilt to the race.

It is still up in the air as to whether the U.S. Senate will need the N.C. race to determine whether the GOP claims control of the upper chamber of Congress or not. My thinking right now: there are many pathways (and a few obstacles) that the GOP can have to claim the 6 additional seats to capture majority control of the Senate. Both North Carolina and New Hampshire are probably more "canary in the coalmine" indicates of how the GOP may fare: if NC and NH remain in Democratic hands, then the Republicans will need some combination of red-states, such as Arkansas, Alaska, Louisiana (most likely to go to run-off) and then one competitive purple state, say Iowa or Colorado, to make their numbers work--combined with holding both Georgia and Kansas, two states they probably hadn't bet on contesting.

2. Do we continue to see a polarized electorate?

Based on research from the 2012's general election by the American National Election Study, the traditional electorate looks something like this in a presidential year:

Granted, this isn't a presidential election year, so mid-term electorates generally become more Republican, more white, and older in comparison.

But when it comes to the polarization effect, the classification that one identifies with has a strong connection to one's voting behavior.

Between strong partisans to leaning-independents, the likelihood is that they will vote for their party 85 to 99 percent of the time.  Only "pure independents"--usually less than 15 percent of the national electorate--are the swing voters.

And here in North Carolina, we see a similar, albeit more "center-right" when it comes to independent voters, in voting behavior:

So we have an idea of how these voters will behavior when they show up--that's the next big question, though.

3. Who Shows Up?

In North Carolina, the lean-GOP factor in mid-terms are quite noticeable. Granted, the rise of North Carolina's unaffiliated voters has been quite dramatic over the past few election cycles:

But the question remains: do unaffiliated voters show up at the same rate as partisan registered voters?

With the marked boxes of the past two mid-term elections (2006 and 2010), registered unaffiliated voters don't show at the same level of partisan registered voters.

What this tells us is that the electorate, in past mid-terms in North Carolina, should lean to the right, in comparison to the pool of eligible, registered voters overall.

So, what might we see this year in terms of an electorate? Well, since we already have some votes cast (1.1M+ in early ballots), we see something that may appear "out of the ordinary" when it comes to mid-terms in the Old North State:

Registered Democrats are 48 percent of the early in person ballots that came in with 7 reduced days, while registered Republicans were 32 percent and registered unaffiliated voters were 20 percent.  This is much more in line with a presidential year percentage basis of early in person ballots than a mid-term electorate, which is typically 45 D/37 R/18 U.

Among those 2014 voters who cast in person early ballots and how they voted in 2010:

The notable thing is that one third of registered unaffiliated voters and one quarter of registered Democrats did not participate in 2010, either by not being registered, not living in the state, or simply not voting.

4. But even if these folks do show up to cast ballots, will they have anything in North Carolina beyond a competitive U.S. Senate race?

Not likely.

Nationally, the percentage of competitive U.S. House of Representative races has declined substantially, to basically a hand-full of races that aren't in one camp or the other.

In North Carolina, we mirror that trend with 13 non-competitive congressional districts, and with only one flipping tonight due to the current incumbent (Democrat Mike McIntyre in the 7th) not running for re-election.

This is due partly to redistricting and gerrymandering, and due partly to voters becoming locked into voting for their party candidates both at the top and going down the ballot.

This impacts even the North Carolina General Assembly, with the connection between how a legislative district voted for Obama and how the district voted for the Democratic legislative candidate.

So, in the end, the predictions I would make are the following:

• Republicans retain control of the U.S. House of Representatives.
• Republicans gain majority control of the U.S. Senate, but the pathway there is unclear. I suspect Alaska, Arkansas, and Colorado flip to make the 51 needed, and there may be some other states that flip as well--most likely Iowa, Louisiana (in a December run-off). If Kansas goes independent, then the GOP needs Georgia, either tonight or in January, to build on the numbers.
• North Carolina's Senate race may come down to a 2-3 percent margin of victory; right now, it seems like it could stay Democratic, but no bets as it is a coin-toss.
• Republicans continue to have majority control of both chambers of the North Carolina General Assembly: biggest question is, can Democrats break the 3/5 supermajority to crack the veto-override numbers in one or the other? If Democrats can, slight favor to doing so in the House rather than the Senate.
• With GOP control of Congress, expect more partisan gridlock between both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. And it won't be just in Congress as well--one of the key questions out of the National American Election Studies from 2012 was a question, "is there anything you like about the Democratic or Republican parties?" Sorting by partisanship and identification, you get this:

Partisans love their party, don't like the opposition, and even independent leaners are mirror images of each other.  Pure independents--well, a 'pox on both parties' is best to describe them.

Oh, and one other prediction: we won't get through Wednesday before someone asks "so what about 2016's presidential election?"

The Day Before Election Day, A Few Readjustments to NC's Early Voting Numbers

We've seen a slight revision in the numbers of NC early votes coming in today right before the big day on Tuesday.

The early ballots--civilian mail-in, military mail-in, in person one-stop, and overseas mail-in--are 1,191,162, with the vast majority--1,097,563--come in via in person one-stop balloting.

Of these 1.19 million ballots, 1,155,666 have been accepted and recorded as votes for tomorrow's election, with 35,496 ballots remaining outstanding that could come in via mail or in-person, due to sick or disabled voters having until 5 PM Monday to return request (corrected) their ballots.

So we will probably see some further slight movement, especially with mail-in ballots coming in over the next few days. 

As of today's numbers regarding those who have cast early in person ballots, the composition of the electorate remains the same as we've seen over the past few days: 

Cumulatively, registered Democrats are 48.5 percent of the ballots cast via in person early voting, registered Republicans are 31.1 percent of the ballots cast, and registered unaffiliated/Libertarian voters are 20.4 percent of the early ballots cast in person.  

These numbers are all significantly above 2010's numbers, which may be due to the competitive nature of the U.S. Senate race, the anger and resulting mobilization of Democrats against the GOP's state government, and the influence of $100 million into the state's airwaves.

For registered Democrats, they saw an additional 106,000 voters cast early in person ballots, registered unaffiliated voters saw 192,000 more voters, and registered Republicans saw 16,000 more voters than in the last mid-term election.  

While these total numbers of in person early ballots doesn't match the 2012 presidential year numbers, the proportion of this electorate is more similar to a presidential year than a traditional mid-term year in North Carolina.

The key, though, is that this year's mid-term election isn't anything like 2006 or 2010 in North Carolina, so we may have to deal with a new ballgame when it comes to 2014.

White voters are 71 percent of the in person early ballots cast, while black voters are 26 percent of these same ballots. That is a closer ratio to a presidential year performance than the 2010 performance by racial groups.

Among the party registration and how these 2014 in person early voters participated in the 2010 mid-term elections:

The key here is the significant plurality of registered unaffiliated voters (33 percent) and registered Democrats (25 percent) who did not participate (either due to the fact that they weren't in the state, weren't registered, or simply didn't vote) in 2010.  

Let the actual Election Day activities begin! GO VOTE! 

NC's In-Person Early Voting Comes to An End

We have the final totals for the vast majority of early votes coming in for North Carolina's general election; a small number of mail-in ballots will continue to trickle in, but the numbers point to a substantial turnout by North Carolina voters through the early voting period.

Of all ballots requested:

Overall, using both the mail-in requests (including those ballots that have been requested and those returned and accepted so far) and the in-person early voting method, North Carolina has the potential of seeing 1,192,190 votes cast before Tuesday's election.

Of all ballots accepted as votes:

Out of this 1.19 million votes cast, 1,155,131 ballots (both by mail-in and in-person) have been accepted as votes for Tuesday's election counting, with the following breakdowns by the different methods of balloting:

Among these accepted mail-in and in-person ballots:

• registered Democrats are 47.6 percent
• registered Republicans are 31.9 percent
• registered Unaffiliated voters are 20.3 percent
• Women are 54.2 percent
• White voters are 71.6 percent
• Black voters are 25.0 percent

Of all accepted ballots that were cast in-person:

Out of the accepted ballots that were cast in-person by North Carolinians, 1,097,560 have been recorded for votes on Tuesday.  This represents 121 percent of the 2010 numbers on the last day of early in-person voting in 2010.  The cumulative totals for these accepted in-person early votes are:

• registered Democratic voters cast 48.5 percent of the in-person accepted ballots, for a total of 532,026 ballots, representing 125 percent of the final day Democratic totals in 2010
• registered Republican voters cast 31.1 percent of the in-person accepted ballots, for a total of 341,523 ballots, representing 105 percent of the final day Republican totals in 2010
• registered Unaffiliated & Libertarian voters cast 20.4 percent of the in-person accepted ballots, for a total of 224,011 ballots, representing 145 percent of the final day unaffiliated/Libertarian totals in 2010.
• Female voters ended up casting 54.1 percent of the in-person accepted ballots
• White voters are 70.8 percent of the total in-person accepted ballots
• Black voters are 25.8 percent of the total in-person accepted ballots

Saturday's daily total of 103,128 for accepted in-person ballots was:

• registered Democrats: 48.5 percent
• registered Republicans: 30.4 percent
• registered Unaffiliated/Libertarians: 21 percent
• Women: 53.5 percent
• White voters: 65.4 percent
• Black voters: 29.9 percent

The trend line in comparing the daily cumulative totals of in-person accepted ballots against the numbers in 2010, as measured by the days out from the election, show the sizable performance of registered Democrats and registered Unaffiliated voters over their numbers from four years ago:

Finally, the voters who have participated in this year's in-person early voting and comparing their voting behavior in 2010's mid-term election shows a significant number of registered Unaffiliated and Democratic voters showing up who didn't cast ballots four years ago:

Additional Analysis (as of 2 PM):

In looking at the voters who were registered to vote in 2010 but didn't vote in the mid-term four years ago, but did show up to cast an early ballot this year, we see some interesting numbers that could give us a clue on the ground game and interest level among the different groups of voters.

Among these 75,616 voters who cast 2014 in-person early ballots and were registered to vote in 2010 but didn't vote in 2010:

• 40,986 are registered Democrats, representing 54 percent of these voters
• 17,892 are registered Republicans, representing 24 percent of these voters
• 16,597 are registered Unaffiliated voters, representing 22 percent of these voters

Among each party registration in terms of race:

Among registered Democrats who cast 2014 in-person early ballots and were registered in 2010 but didn't vote in that year's mid-term election, 54 percent are black voters, with 42 percent white.  Among registered unaffiliated voters, 77 percent are white, while 14 percent are black voters.

Additional Analysis (as of 5 PM):

Among the 2014 NC in-person early voters who were registered in 2010 but didn't vote that year, fifty percent of these voters were in twelve counties (in order of the largest number of total voters): Mecklenburg, Wake, Guilford, Cumberland, Forsyth, Buncombe, Gaston, Durham, Union, Iredell, Pitt, and Catawba counties.

For registered Democrats, half of their 40K votes came from Mecklenburg, Wake, Guilford, Cumberland, Forsyth, Durham, Buncombe, Gaston, Pitt, Union, Wayne, and Orange counties.

For registered Republicans, half of their nearly 18K votes came from Mecklenburg, Wake, Guilford, Union, Gaston, Iredell, Randolph, Buncombe, Catawba, Forsyth, Cumberland, Davidson and Wayne counties.

For registered unaffiliated voters, half of their 16K votes came from Mecklenburg, Wake, Guilford, Buncombe, Forsyth, Cumberland, Union, Durham, Gaston, Orange and Iredell counties.

For all the NC Counties, here are their numbers of 2014 in-person early voters who were registered in 2010 but did not vote in 2010:

	DEM	LIB	REP	UNA	TOTAL
MECKLENBURG	5481	15	1558	1952	9006
WAKE	3591	22	1250	1912	6775
GUILFORD	2806	11	910	815	4542
CUMBERLAND	1679	2	434	485	2600
FORSYTH	1551	3	520	496	2570
BUNCOMBE	1109	6	530	704	2349
GASTON	1002	4	690	412	2108
DURHAM	1482	4	161	421	2068
UNION	704	0	702	463	1869
IREDELL	633	0	578	378	1589
PITT	868	1	335	265	1469
CATAWBA	485	3	521	329	1338
WAYNE	691	1	388	184	1264
NEW HANOVER	603	4	293	357	1257
ALAMANCE	608	3	321	244	1176
RANDOLPH	381	2	558	228	1169
ORANGE	643	7	117	384	1151
CRAVEN	562	3	254	218	1037
NASH	517	1	310	173	1001
CABARRUS	452	1	305	226	984
ONSLOW	398	0	326	240	964
ROCKINGHAM	543	0	245	167	955
JOHNSTON	400	3	295	248	946
DAVIDSON	325	1	390	185	901
BURKE	422	1	232	220	875
ROWAN	367	0	301	182	850
CLEVELAND	529	0	165	112	806
HENDERSON	237	2	242	261	742
BRUNSWICK	280	1	197	209	687
ROBESON	506	1	44	79	630
MOORE	262	2	209	145	618
CALDWELL	208	1	277	126	612
RUTHERFORD	301	0	198	103	602
FRANKLIN	362	1	122	114	599
LENOIR	391	1	106	96	594
CARTERET	226	0	203	164	593
SCOTLAND	399	0	64	128	591
LEE	353	0	140	97	590
CHATHAM	301	0	102	179	582
GRANVILL	392	0	78	108	578
HARNETT	336	1	148	91	576
EDGECOMB	485	0	43	41	569
SURRY	242	1	216	98	557
LINCOLN	217	1	196	113	527
WILSON	354	0	114	59	527
BEAUFORT	319	2	110	91	522
HALIFAX	376	1	32	79	488
VANCE	348	1	63	62	474
SAMPSON	283	1	103	67	454
STANLY	189	2	155	106	452
HOKE	292	2	44	79	417
PERSON	242	1	79	91	413
RICHMOND	275	0	62	73	410
PASQUOTANK	212	1	56	79	348
PENDER	175	3	83	81	342
HAYWOOD	182	1	56	85	324
TRANSYLVANIA	129	1	67	102	299
WILKES	88	0	144	65	297
COLUMBUS	214	0	36	42	292
ALEXANDER	112	1	114	64	291
DARE	117	1	71	80	269
STOKES	114	1	88	51	254
WATAUGA	90	3	49	97	239
MCDOWELL	77	1	93	60	231
DAVIE	66	0	97	60	223
WARREN	185	0	12	21	218
MACON	71	0	59	68	198
BLADEN	129	0	25	36	190
JACKSON	102	0	39	44	185
BERTIE	146	0	12	23	181
PAMLICO	106	0	37	36	179
ANSON	151	0	10	14	175
DUPLIN	118	0	36	18	172
MARTIN	119	0	21	27	167
MADISON	85	1	36	40	162
CASWELL	118	1	18	23	160
ASHE	47	0	52	41	140
POLK	37	0	44	58	139
SWAIN	72	1	30	34	137
GREENE	85	0	14	32	131
YANCEY	55	1	42	30	128
CHEROKEE	34	0	56	30	120
ALLEGHANY	63	1	29	25	118
MITCHELL	19	0	64	34	117
MONTGOMERY	68	0	19	25	112
WASHINGTON	92	0	9	11	112
CHOWAN	65	0	26	16	107
NORTHAMPTON	89	0	6	8	103
YADKIN	27	0	54	19	100
HERTFORD	64	0	7	18	89
PERQUIMAS	49	0	15	14	78
CAMDEN	31	0	20	24	75
CURRITUCK	24	0	19	27	70
CLAY	22	1	14	27	64
GRAHAM	19	0	21	17	57
AVERY	7	1	33	14	55
JONES	27	0	20	8	55
GATES	43	0	2	7	52
TYRRELL	20	0	1	3	24
HYDE	13	1	0	0	14