Ohio Senate 2010 Baselines – Fisher vs Portman

So anyway, yeah, in case you haven’t heard, we have another razor-close federal election shaping up in Ohio.  I know, surprise surprise, but I’m going to try to diagram where I think both candidates need to do to win this election.  I’ll start with each candidates’ respective bases and then move to the swing areas.  

Fisher’s base – Lee Fisher’s base is in Cuyahoga County and in democratic northeastern Ohio.  As such, to win this election, he’s going to need to run up percentages mirroring what Barack Obama got at the very least, and he should be able to beat his percentages in some areas that were cool to Obama for cultural reasons.  

Portman’s base – Rob Portman’s base is in the Cincinnati area and in southwestern Ohio.  As such, to win the election, Portman is going to need to run extremely well in metro Cincinnati and in the rural reaches of the west and southwest of the state.  His goal should be to meet or exceed the percentages put up here by George W. Bush in 2004.  

Now for the really important stuff.  Assuming Portman and Fisher carry their bases (and believe me, if one doesn’t, they are toast), there are three regions that need to be watched to see who is going to pull this one out.  One area is fairly populous, and the other two aren’t, but nevertheless could swing the race.

1.Northwestern Ohio – This area includes Toledo and the rural reaches surrounding it.  The farmlands are usually solid GOP, but Barack Obama exposed a divide here, as he did extremely well in the farmlands along the I-80 corridor, winning several counties not won since Clinton and holding down margins elsewhere.  Portman must seek to sweep this area and put up numbers similar to George W. Bush’s 2000/2004 marks and hold down the margin a bit in Toledo.  A lot of this region falls into the economic conservative/social liberal category, so Portman’s job might not be as difficult as it would appear on paper given the year.

2.Southeastern Ohio – This region is one in which democrats usually do well, but despite his win Barack Obama had difficulties here in 2008, mostly due to race and cultural difficulties in the mostly white, working-class electorate.  Lee Fisher, being an establishment Ohio democrat, shouldn’t have too many issues here.  The electorate is socially conservative/economically liberal, and probably wouldn’t be inclined to like Portman’s financial stickiness and his support of offshoring.  The GOP candidate’s goal will be to try to replicate John McCain’s success here, but his job will be more difficult because of his policy positions.

3.The I-70 corridor – This is the one region of the state that is often the decider in a close election, and it surprises me that it never seems to get much coverage.  What is the I-70 corridor?  I define it as a belt that stretches through three counties, that until recently were swingish, and includes the cities of Dayton, Springfield, and Columbus.  All three of these places could potentially be competitive in this election, though Columbus less so than the others.  Fisher will need to win Dayton and especially Columbus by big margins and try to win Springfield outright, while Portman will try to pull an upset in Dayton, win Springfield strongly, and hold the margin close in Columbus.

Which brings us to the map:

Colors:

Pink/Light Blue – 0-6% win

Red/Blue – 6-12% win

Dark Red/Dark Blue – 12%+ win

As you can see here, the northeastern base for Fisher and the southwestern base for Portman are well represented, as are the swing regions of the state.  If the election were to play out exactly like this, we’d be heading to a recount, though Fisher would have a lead of about 10k votes.  So consider these the marks that Fisher has to hit, and that Portman must beat, to win.  The turnout totals are based on the 2006 senate election, slightly modified for population growth/loss and expected turnout.

county fisher portman

Northwest Region 261357 293658 555015 47.1% 52.9%

williams 5838 7143 12981 45.0% 55.0%

defiance 6024 7577 13601 44.3% 55.7%

paulding 2956 4576 7532 39.2% 60.8%

van wert 3577 6839 10416 34.3% 65.7%

mercer 4813 10718 15531 31.0% 69.0%

auglaize 5745 11842 17587 32.7% 67.3%

allen 14197 21921 36118 39.3% 60.7%

putnam 3300 10539 13839 23.8% 76.2%

henry 5094 6377 11471 44.4% 55.6%

fulton 7336 8679 16015 45.8% 54.2%

lucas 80630 56159 136789 58.9% 41.1%

wood 22805 22747 45552 50.1% 49.9%

hancock 8498 18621 27119 31.3% 68.7%

hardin 4079 5703 9782 41.7% 58.3%

wyandot 3212 4901 8113 39.6% 60.4%

crawford 7227 9455 16682 43.3% 56.7%

seneca 9442 10643 20085 47.0% 53.0%

sandusky 11299 11583 22882 49.4% 50.6%

ottawa 9548 8972 18520 51.6% 48.4%

erie 16572 13018 29590 56.0% 44.0%

huron 8934 9994 18928 47.2% 52.8%

richland 20231 25651 45882 44.1% 55.9%

Northeast Region 840114 587727 1427841 58.8% 41.2%

lorain 58129 41429 99558 58.4% 41.6%

ashland 7740 11449 19189 40.3% 59.7%

holmes 2210 5841 8051 27.5% 72.5%

wayne 15799 22485 38284 41.3% 58.7%

medina 30586 36186 66772 45.8% 54.2%

cuyahoga 295568 139235 434803 68.0% 32.0%

summit 116776 78559 195335 59.8% 40.2%

stark 71975 67353 139328 51.7% 48.3%

portage 30776 23875 54651 56.3% 43.7%

geauga 18403 23153 41556 44.3% 55.7%

lake 46649 43988 90637 51.5% 48.5%

ashtabula 18651 14878 33529 55.6% 44.4%

trumbull 49586 28520 78106 63.5% 36.5%

mahoning 58364 32851 91215 64.0% 36.0%

columbiana 18902 17925 36827 51.3% 48.7%

Central Region 386100 409689 795789 48.5% 51.5%

marion 9578 12026 21604 44.3% 55.7%

morrow 5176 7299 12475 41.5% 58.5%

coshocton 6024 7340 13364 45.1% 54.9%

knox 9041 12536 21577 41.9% 58.1%

licking 24599 35312 59911 41.1% 58.9%

muskingum 13664 14534 28198 48.5% 51.5%

delaware 27709 43024 70733 39.2% 60.8%

union 6550 11281 17831 36.7% 63.3%

logan 6409 9797 16206 39.5% 60.5%

champaign 5689 8498 14187 40.1% 59.9%

madison 5414 8010 13424 40.3% 59.7%

franklin 209461 168198 377659 55.5% 44.5%

fairfield 23283 33506 56789 41.0% 59.0%

perry 5927 5255 11182 53.0% 47.0%

hocking 5064 4662 9726 52.1% 47.9%

pickaway 7458 11459 18917 39.4% 60.6%

ross 11761 11801 23562 49.9% 50.1%

fayette 3293 5151 8444 39.0% 61.0%

Southwest Region 399464 582617 982081 40.7% 59.3%

darke 7067 13111 20178 35.0% 65.0%

shelby 6122 11101 17223 35.5% 64.5%

miami 12354 24699 37053 33.3% 66.7%

clark 23650 25456 49106 48.2% 51.8%

greene 21415 40797 62212 34.4% 65.6%

montgomery 95491 90122 185613 51.4% 48.6%

preble 5621 10036 15657 35.9% 64.1%

butler 38443 80854 119297 32.2% 67.8%

hamilton 129134 155467 284601 45.4% 54.6%

clermont 22333 46588 68921 32.4% 67.6%

warren 19102 54588 73690 25.9% 74.1%

clinton 4505 8187 12692 35.5% 64.5%

highland 5174 7797 12971 39.9% 60.1%

brown 5650 8547 14197 39.8% 60.2%

adams 3403 5267 8670 39.3% 60.7%

Southeast Region 126748 127907 254655 49.8% 50.2%

pike 4845 4798 9643 50.2% 49.8%

scioto 13466 12708 26174 51.4% 48.6%

lawrence 8261 11216 19477 42.4% 57.6%

jackson 4453 5833 10286 43.3% 56.7%

gallia 3903 6155 10058 38.8% 61.2%

vinton 1884 2601 4485 42.0% 58.0%

meigs 3190 4569 7759 41.1% 58.9%

athens 10788 5739 16527 65.3% 34.7%

morgan 2655 2823 5478 48.5% 51.5%

guernsey 6334 6905 13239 47.8% 52.2%

noble 2311 2859 5170 44.7% 55.3%

washington 10231 12540 22771 44.9% 55.1%

monroe 3431 2535 5966 57.5% 42.5%

belmont 13190 10356 23546 56.0% 44.0%

jefferson 13473 12188 25661 52.5% 47.5%

harrison 2930 3050 5980 49.0% 51.0%

tuscarawas 15860 15524 31384 50.5% 49.5%

carroll 5543 5508 11051 50.2% 49.8%

Statewide Total 2013783 2001598 4015381 50.15% 49.85%