Month: July 2009

Here is another Democratic gerrymander, this time in Pennsylvania. I am not sure if we can pick up the entire legislature and retain the governorship. If we did, they would probably try to protect new Democrats instead of heading for an all out gerrymander. In my opinion, my map is not too realistic but just in case the Democrats have total control…. This map protects new Democrats while eliminating one Republican seat and endangering the incumbents of two others. I eliminated Charlie Dent’s seat assuming he survives 2010.I am aiming for a 14-4 Democratic delegation as a revenge for the planned 13-6 Republican delegation. My only worry for the Democrats is the 11th district with Paul Kanjorski but even there he should be safe. Here are the maps.

East Pennsylvania

West Pennsylvania

Philadelphia Area

Pittsburgh Area

District 1 Robert Brady (D) Dark Blue

Robert Brady’s district was safe with the old map and will remain safe this time, even though his district is less safe. I removed some African American areas in western Philadelphia and Delaware County. I added some white parts of Delaware County but they should not affect the voting habits of this district much. Obama probably won 73% of the vote here. Racial stats are 19% African American, 18% Hispanic, 6% Asian and 53% White. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 2 Chaka Fattah (D) Dark Green

For population purposes, I had to send this district up into some white parts of Montgomery County but that should not alter the voting of this district. It stays mostly the same. Obama probably won 85% of the vote here. Racial stats are 58% African American and 32% White. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 3 Kathy Dahlkemper (D) Dark Purple

I was worried about her because she is a freshman. To protect her, I removed all of heavily Republican Butler County and substituted it with some marginal territory along the border. I extended it into the middle of the state to pick up Elk County which Obama barely won. I probably raised Obama’s performance to 53%. She should be safe without a strong challenge. Racial stats are 92% White. Status is Likely Democrat.

District 4 Jason Altmire (D) vs. Tim Murphy (R) Red

To strengthen Altmire, I removed all of Butler County and added some of marginal Washington County. I slipped in some precincts in Pittsburgh as well. He appeared safe in 2008 and he should be even safer. Murphy will probably run in the heavily Republican 17th district so Altmire should not worry. McCain probably won 50% of the vote here. Racial stats are 5% African American and 91% White. Status is Likely Democrat.

District 5 G.T Thompson (R) Yellow

I made this district more Republican to strengthen Democrats in the 3rd and 10th districts. This district basically goes further east, loses Penn State and stays heavily Republican. McCain probably won 63% of the vote here. Racial stats are 95% White, the whitest district in Pennsylvania. Status is Safe Republican.

District 6 Open (Gerleach) (R) Teal

Trust me; this district is not electing a Republican anytime soon. With Gerleach out, this new district would oust any Republican who might have won in 2010. That will probably not be necessary because the Democrats have some good candidates here. The changes I made were removing most of Chester County while giving the district more of Montgomery County. For good measure, 9% of the district is in Philadelphia. The part it has is 75% African American. I see almost no way for a Republican to win here. Obama probably won 64% of the vote here. Racial stats are 13% African American and 78% White. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 7 Open Joe Sestak (D) Gray

I’m a bit worried about this district because I had to extend it all the way out into Republican areas in Lancaster County. I definitely offset Republican margins from Lancaster by putting in heavily African American parts of Philadelphia in this district. Since Chester County is trending Democratic, this district should stay with the Democrats. Obama probably won 57% of the vote here. Racial stats are 14% African American and 77% White. Status is Safe/Likely Democrat.

District 8 Patrick Murphy (D) Light Purple

All I did here was help shore up Murphy by putting in more of Philadelphia which is now 22% of the district’s population. I also removed part of northern Bucks County. Murphy should be fine now. Obama probably won 57% of the vote here. Racial stats are 86% White. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 9 Bill Shuster (R) Bright Blue

I kept the district pretty much the way it is. All I did was move it east so that it is only a few miles away from Harrisburg. I took in Snyder and Union Counties to help strengthen Chris Carney. Anyway, Shuster is safe in the most Republican district in Pennsylvania. McCain probably won 65% of the vote here. Racial stats are 94% White. Status is Safe Republican.

District 10 Chris Carney (D) Pink

If Chris Carney does not represent this district, he probably lost in a primary, retired or the Republicans found the strongest candidate possible. I took out all the heavily Republican western counties and snaked the district into Northampton County (Bethlehem) and Monroe County which voted for Bush but McCain lost it by 17 points. The rural counties to the north lean Republican but they only gave McCain a combined 6,000 vote margin. The only worry I have is that Dent will run but the Democratic margins from Lackawanna, Luzerne and Monroe Counties should offset Dent’s margins from his old district. With the inclusion of most of Lackawanna County are more of Luzerne, Carney is safe. Obama probably won 55% of the vote here. Racial stats are 87% White and 5% Hispanic. Status is Safe Democrat, Likely Democrat if Dent runs.

District 11 Paul Kanjorski (D) Light Green

I am a bit worried about Kanjorski. I had to shore up other Democrats so he lost a few Democratic areas. I tried to help him by sending his district into Lehigh County (Allentown) which Obama won by 15 points. Republican Charlie Dent who represents the 15th district in Allentown may want to run here. Kanjorski had a tight race in 2008 but if he loses, a strong Democrat will probably beat the Republican who won it. Obama probably won 56% of the vote here. Racial stats are 84% White and 9% Hispanic. Status is Lean Democrat.

District 12 John Murtha (D) Indigo

Due to calling his constituents “racists,” Murtha had a ‘tough’ race in 2008 but won by 16 points. The Republicans probably will challenge him again. I’m not the biggest fan of John Murtha myself but we need as many Democrats as possible and a safe district when he retires. To shore him up, I removed all of Armstrong County and part of Westmoreland County. I added in a slice of Alleghany County, all of marginal Fayette County and Penn State. Murtha should be happy. Obama probably won 52% of the vote here. Racial stats are 92% White. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 13 Allyson Schwartz (D) Tan

I had to change Schwartz’s district quite a bit. First, I took out much of Philadelphia and replaced it with part of Bucks and Northumberland Counties. Since those areas both voted Democratic, Schwartz should be safe. She should worry about a primary challenge from the Bethlehem area but her Philadelphia base should probably keep her in Congress. Obama probably won 58-59% of the vote here. Racial stats are 7% African American, 6% Hispanic and 80% White. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 14 Mike Doyle (D) Algae Green

To help protect Altmire, I had to remove the western part of Pittsburgh from this district and substitute it with more Conservative suburbs to the north and south. They should not be nearly enough to endanger Doyle, he appears safe. Obama probably won 65% of the vote here. Racial stats are 19% African American and 74% White. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 15 Tim Holden (D) Orange

Even though Holden seems pretty safe (he won by 28 points in 2008,) I figured that the Republicans would eventually field a strong candidate against him. To help Holden, I added part of Allentown and removed part of Republican Lebanon County. Holden should have no problem at all now that his district is more Democratic. If Charlie Dent ran here, he would probably lose. Obama probably won 51%-52% of the vote here. Racial stats are 7% African American and 5% Hispanic. Status is Safe Democrat.

District 16 Joe Pitts (R) Light green (in Lancaster County)

I am not completely sure if we can knock off Pitts but we definitely have a good shot at it. I removed some of the rural areas in Lancaster County making the district more centered on the city Lancaster. Even though I included part of Republican Lebanon County, I added more of Democratic Reading. The final blow to Pitts is that even though he loses part of Democratic leaning Chester County, he gets heavily Democratic areas in Delaware County and even a couple of precincts in Philadelphia. This should attract some Delaware County Democrats to run. It should be a tight race because Pitts is pretty entrenched yet his margins are dropping. Obama probably won 52% of the vote here. Racial stats are 9% African American, 14% Hispanic and 73% White. Status is Toss Up.

District 17 No Incumbent (R) Dark Purple

If I were Tim Murphy, I would move to this district and run here. It contains part of his old district and takes in the heavily Republican areas of Butler and Armstrong Counties. Other Republicans will probably aim for this seat but Murphy should probably beat them. McCain probably won 61% of the vote here. Racial stats are 95% White. Status is Safe Republican.

District 18 Todd Platts (R) Yellow (on the southern border)

This district stays basically the same. All I changed was that I shrank the district and added some rural areas in Lancaster. Platts is fine. McCain probably won 59% of the vote here. Racial stats are 89% White. Status is Safe Republican.

Having grown up in North Carolina and being a distant relative to “Senator Sam”, I’ve been told many times that his Class 3 Senate seat has been cursed.  Is this true?  Here are the facts:

(1)  Sam Ervin was a conservative Democrat that held the highest regards for the U.S. Constitution.  He was often at odds with the Democratic party on key issues, especially civil rights.

(2)  Sam Ervin was the chair of the Watergate Committee.  

(3)  Sam Ervin’s replacement, Bob Morgan, was from a similar mold as Sam, but not as eloquent in delivery.  Having served for one term, he was defeated in 1980 due in part from the Reagan Revolution.

(4)  Morgan’s successor, John East, was a conservative Republican East Carolina professor from the same cloth as Jesse Helms.  East was bound in a wheelchair, had been suffering, and commits suicide in 1986.

(5)  Jim Broyhill is appointed to replace John East.  Broyhill, a Republican, faced former NC Governor Terry Sanford in the general election.  Sanford won due to name recognition and the fact that 1986 was a Democratic year.

(6)  Terry Sanford votes against the first Gulf War, angering many North Carolinians.  Sanford also suffered from health issues and may wondered if he could serve another 6 years.  Lauch Faircloth (R), a former Democrat and ally of Sanford, defeats Sanford in a close election.

(7)  Faircloth appears to be a clone of Jesse Helms.  He had a fond dislike for President Clinton, making some politically incorrect comment about Clinton’s family and marriage.  Faircloth was also advancing in age.  John Edwards, a young, eloquent speaker, runs as a moderate as a Democrat and defeats Faircloth in another close election.

(8)  John Edwards has further political ambitions and decides in 2003 not to run for another term.  Richard Burr (R) defeats Erskine Bowles (D) in the general election.

(9)  Richard Burr has served 4 1/2 undistinguished years as a US Senator.  Many North Carolinians have no clue that he is their US Senator.  He’s displayed poor judgment (i.e. telling his wife to withdraw as much money as allowable from the ATM because of the financial crisis).

Is this seat cursed?  Or is it the fact that mitigating circumstances has prevented the incumbent from serving more than one term?

That’s the word on the street, according to the Chicago Tribune:

Three-term state comptroller Dan Hynes has told top Democrats he intends to seek the party’s nomination for governor, setting up a February primary challenge to Gov. Pat Quinn, sources familiar with Hynes’ conversations said today. […]

The comptroller starts the race with a major fundraising advantage. Hynes has $3.5 million banked after raising more than $905,000 in the first half of the year. Quinn raised more than $860,000 in that time period but had a little more than $700,000 left.

The sources, who asked not to be identified so as to not pre-empt Hynes’ official announcement, said the comptroller discussed his plans to run with leading Illinois Democrats. No timetable was given for Hynes’ formal entry into the race, but politicians can begin soliciting signatures for their candidacy petitions on Aug. 4.

You may remember Dan Hynes was one of the also-rans of the 2004 Democratic Senatorial primary, taking nearly 24% of the vote to Barack Obama’s 53%. He’s been looking to move up the ladder ever since, and was considered a likely AG candidate before Lisa Madigan announced her plans to seek re-election. The Tribune lays out what will likely be the battle lines of this primary:

As the keeper of the state’s checkbook, Hynes has become a growing critic of Quinn, noting in late June that the governor had “confused” legislators and the public and inciting “fear and panic” by promoting a “false choice” of either an income-tax hike or cuts in social services.

Hynes said then that Quinn had failed to cut the state budget, a necessary component in trying to gain public support for increasing taxes. Hynes advocated cuts of about $1.2 billion and new casinos, higher cigarette taxes, the closing of some corporate loopholes and broadening the state sales tax to luxury items as a way to raise $1.8 billion.

Earlier this month, Hynes accused Quinn of blocking legislation the comptroller pushed to impose new regulations and tougher criminal penalties for the cemetery industry, an outgrowth of the gruesome discovery of remains and double burials at Burr Oak Cemetery in Alsip. Instead, Quinn formed a commission to review cemetery regulations.

This promises to be a pretty lively fight. As an afterthought, I wonder how Hynes’ decision will affect Chris Kennedy, a man who clearly wants to run for a statewide office in 2010, but one who seems very, very confused about his options.

RaceTracker Wiki: IL-Gov

This is probably old news to all of you, but it is rather rare that a story about a House member gets reported on the half-hour evening news.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/…

The most important question for us horse-race analysts is probably, “What does this mean for whether he’s gonna be running at all, and for which seat?”.  The guy, who’s both a moderate Republican and a veteran member of Congress, is obviously aware of these shenanigans, but does he want to have to deal with them?

In other news, please say hi to Bill “Quarter Alligator” Posey on your way out.

Here’s the full statement, which includes some nice barbs at the GOP:

“There has been a lot of speculation as to whether I would run in a special election for the 23rd Congressional District.

“My priority must continue to be the work I have started in the state Senate, representing Oswego, Jefferson and St. Lawrence counties. My commitment is to the people of the 48th Senate District and has been all along. Before I could even consider the possibility of serving another eight counties, I had a duty to finish out this year’s session.

“This seat in Congress belongs to the people who live in these 11 counties, not any elected official or political party.

“Unfortunately, the National Republican Party has viewed the seat differently. National Republicans have demonstrated their belief that party registration matters more than the issues by spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to attack and vilify me.  They never mentioned the important issues we care about here in the 23rd, whether it’s our military and Fort Drum, border security and international trade, agriculture, energy and the economy of the future, or rural healthcare.

“It’s no small wonder why the Washington Republicans are going extinct, and contributors should question why the money they’ve given was squandered here for no good reason at all.

“I support the process that the Democratic Party has put in place to come up with a candidate to run for the expected vacancy in the 23rd Congressional District. I’m certain the 11 county chairs involved in the process will continue to move toward finding a qualified candidate who understands the issues here and will embark on an honest campaign that puts people before politics.”

Count me as relieved. Control of the state Senate going into the next round of redistricting (both congressional and legislative) is too precious a commodity right now. We need every seat we can get in the state Senate.

While Aubertine would have been a very strong candidate for this seat, hopefully the local Democratic chairs can pick a strong, qualified nominee to give us a fighting chance against Scozzafava. More updates as we get ’em.

RaceTracker Wiki: NY-23

Quinnipiac (7/16-20, registered voters, 5/20-25 in parens, 3/26-31 in parens for Foley match-up):

Chris Dodd (D-inc): 39 (39)

Rob Simmons (R): 48 (45)

Undecided: 10 (13)

Chris Dodd (D-inc): 42 (41)

Sam Caligiuri (R): 40 (39)

Undecided: 15 (17)

Chris Dodd (D-inc): 42 (35)

Tom Foley (R): 42 (43)

Undecided: 14 (16)

Chris Dodd (D-inc): 43

Peter Schiff (R): 38

Undecided: 16

(MoE: ±2.5%)

Woof. The subtle consensus over the past couple of months has been that Dodd was beginning his slow climb back to respectability (and electoral viability) by keeping his nose clean and burying himself in the legislative process — especially since his numbers ticked upward slightly in the last Q-Poll of the race — but these numbers are still freak-nasty.

The Q also takes another look at the Dem and GOP primaries:

Chris Dodd (D-inc): 52 (44)

Merick Alpert (D): 18 (24)

Undecided: 27 (30)

(MoE: ±4%)

Rob Simmons (R): 42 (48)

Sam Caligiuri (R): 5 (10)

Tom Foley (R): 5 (n/a)

Peter Schiff (R): 0 (n/a)

Undecided: 45 (39)

(MoE: ±5%)

Well, at least those numbers look a little better for Dodd, but they’re hardly anything to brag about. On the bright side, though, Dodd’s overall favorables are inching in the right direction. After cratering in Quinnipiac’s late March survey at 30-58 (ouch!), Dodd’s currently sitting on a 40-50 favorable rating, up from 37-51 in May. Still bad, but no longer utterly toxic.

RaceTracker Wiki: CT-Sen

Strategic Vision (R) (7/17-19, likely voters, 6-12/14 in parentheses):

Roy Barnes (D): 46 (49)

Thurbert Baker (D): 31 (30)

David Poythress (D): 4 (5)

Dubose Porter (D): 3 (2)

Undecided: 16 (14)

John Oxendine (R): 38 (35)

Nathan Deal (R): 16 (12)

Karen Handel (R): 9 (13)

Eric Johnson (R): 5 (4)

Ray McBerry (R): 3 (2)

Austin Scott (R): 2 (2)

Undecided: 27 (32)

(MoE: ±3%)

Republican pollster Strategic Vision takes another look at both the primary fields in the Georgia governor’s race (sorry, no general election matchups). As their previous polls have shown, Insurance Comm. John Oxendine has a head start on the GOP field, while former Gov. Roy Barnes leads the Dems. Strategic Vision has repeatedly shown AG Thurbert Baker polling much stronger than Rasmussen.

Strategic Vision (R) (7/17-19, likely voters, 6-19/21 in parentheses):

Jon Corzine (D-inc): 38 (39)

Chris Christie (R): 53 (51)

Christopher Daggett (I): 5 (N/A)

Undecided: 4 (8)

(MoE: ±3%)

Strategic Vision also takes a look at the New Jersey’s governor’s race. This is very consistent with the most recent Quinnipiac and Rasmussen polls. Suffice it to say that if Jon Corzine is going to start making a move, now would be the time to do it.

Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) got mix of good but mostly bad news with the latest Quinnipiac University Poll testing his long held Senate seat.

Overall, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, former Congressman Rob Simmons (R-CT) has increased his lead over Dodd and now leads him 48%-39%. In May Simmons had only lead Dodd 45%-39%

Dodd also polls poorly for a longtime incumbent against poorly known Republicans in the race. Dodd is tied with former ambassador (and not former US House Speaker) Tom Foley with 42% each, and barely leads state Sen. Sam Caligiuri and investor Peter Schiff.

The poll also tested the primaries on both sides of the isle. Dodd still has some strengh left, at least with Democrats, leading former aide to Vice President Al Gore Merrick Alpert 52%-18% in the primary. On the GOP side, Simmons holds a strong 37 point lead over Foley and Caligiuri, both of whom didnt break 5%, and Schiff, who got a whopping 0%.

The best news for Dodd perhaps? Its still only 2009.

Check out the CQ story here: http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/po…

• AR-Sen: It took new Arkansas Senate candidate Conrad Reynolds only the first day of his candidacy to descend to the same levels of right-wing gaffe insanity as fellow candidates Kim Hendren and Curtis Coleman. Speaking before about a dozen Young Republicans yesterday, he said, “I never thought it would be domestic, but in today’s world I do believe we have enemies here,” and then said “We need someone to stand up to Barack Obama and his policies. We must protect our culture, our Christian identity.” Following his speech, though, before he took questions, he said he’d be careful with answers, as “I don’t want to do a Kim Hendren,” he said.

• NH-Sen: It looks like Ovide Lamontagne is going full speed ahead on a run in the New Hampshire Senate primary, with his path, be it as it may, gaving gotten easier with fellow renegade Fred Tausch dropping out. He hired two key members of the Mitt Romney camp: Charlie Spies, who was the Romney campaign’s CFO, and Jim Merrill, who managed Romney’s NH campaign.

• NV-Sen: Here’s another bad sign for John Ensign: his chief of staff, John Lopez, just bailed out. The timing, with Ensign facing fallout over trying to cover up an affair with a staffer, probably isn’t coincidental.

• PA-Sen: In the wake of yesterday’s ominious Quinnipiac poll, Arlen Specter has retreated to the last refuge of troubled politicians: attacking the poll’s composition. (Hey! That’s our job!) Nate Silver re-ran the numbers using the actual 2008 party split (D 44, R 37, I 18) and found it really didn’t make much difference: 46-43 in Specter’s favor. Meanwhile, a popular new activity among Democratic party bigwigs in Pennsylvania is telling Joe Sestak to shut up; both Allegheny Co. party chair Jim Burn and Philly-area official Penny Gerber took loud exception to implications from the Sestak camp that they were backing him.

• AK-Gov: Two Democrats both officially announced their candidacies to run, presumably, against Sean Parnell in 2010: state Senator Hollis French, and former Dept. of Administration Commissioner Bob Poe. Former state House Minority Leader Ethan Berkowitz also says he’ll officially become a candidate in late summer or early fall.

• MN-Gov: Democratic State Rep. Paul Thissen announced his candidacy for Minnesota’s governor today. Hard to see, though, how a state Representative stands out in a field that seems to contain every major politician in the state.

• CA-10: EMILY’s List finally got involved in the special election in CA-10. As you’d expect, they’re backing Assemblywoman Joan Buchanan, who as the only woman in the race has a definite shot to sneak through while the better-known male candidates (Lt. Gov. John Garamendi and state Sen. Mark DeSaulnier) split the vote.

• IL-10: A new Roll Call piece on IL-10 adds a few more names to the potential primary fields. For the Dems, Highland Park City Councilor Jim Kirsch may get in. And for the GOP, it sounds like state Sen. Matt Murphy is now thinking about running here; he’s currently running for Governor, in a crowded field of second-stringers, and might stand better odds here.

• NC-08: Lou Huddleston, an African-American veteran and defense industry consultant, may wind up being the GOP’s candidate against Larry Kissell; after having visited Capitol Hill for some wooing, he says he’ll decide by Labor Day. (His one attempt at elective politics was a losing campaign for a state House seat in 2008.) Some bigger names, including ex-Rep. Robin Hayes and Charlotte mayor Pat McCrory, haven’t ruled the race out yet, though.

• NJ-03: The Burlington County GOP is saying that moderate state Sen. Diane Allen (who’d been on the short list for Chris Christie’s Lt. Gov. pick) is now their top choice to run against freshman Rep. John Adler. Interestingly, this is the same organization that basically torpedoed her interest in running for the open seat in 2008, leaving more conservative Chris Myers (and presumably less electable) to run instead. Allen is still sounding non-commital, especially since the party leadership in more conservative Ocean County continues to sound lukewarm about her.

• NY-23: The Conservative Party isn’t at all pleased with the selection of socially liberal Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava as the GOP’s candidate in the NY-23 special election. State party chair Mike Long said that likely Democratic candidate Darrel Aubertine actually has a more “palatable” record. The Conservatives plan to run their own candidate on their line, he says, and party activist Jim Kelly has expressed interest.

• OH-02: This is good news: the Democrats actually found an honest-to-gosh state Representative to go against Rep. Jean Schmidt: Todd Book. David Krikorian, who got a sizable share of the vote as an Independent in 2008, is already running as a Democrat in the primary, but looks like he’s getting shoved over: Governor Ted Strickland has already endorsed Book. (Book is from Strickland’s hometown of Portsmouth.)

• SC-01: A Georgetown restauranteur, Robert Dobbs, announced he’ll run for the Democrats in SC-01. He has electoral experience… but in Wisconsin, where he was a Manitowoc County Supervisor. (Although I hope it is, I assume this isn’t the “Bob” Dobbs.) Other more prominent Democratic figures, like state Rep. Leon Stavinrakis, are also considering the race.

• SC-03: Former Cincinnati Bengals coach Sam Wyche, who led the Bengals to the Super Bowl in 1989, is considering running as a Republican for the open seat in the 3rd, vacated by Gresham Barrett, running for Governor. Wyche isn’t a total newbie to politics, as he’s currently serving on the Pickens County Council. He’d bring a lot of name recognition to the field, where state Representative Rex Rice is probably current frontrunner. (Democrats are unlikely to strongly contest this freakishly red district.)

The Census Bureau on Tuesday released a treasure trove of voting statistics, but perhaps most interesting were statistics comparing the Hispanic vote between 2004 and 2008. Here’s Governing magazine’s Josh Goodman on what happened:

The Census estimates that there were 9.745 million Hispanic voters in 2008, compared to 7.587 million in 2004 — an increase of 28.4%. Overall, an estimated 131.114 million Americans voted in 2008, compared to 125.736 million in 2004, an increase of just 4.3%. Another way of looking at it: there were 5.4 million additional votes cast in 2008 compared to 2004 and about 2.2 million of them were cast by Hispanics.

The gain was particularly dramatic in California, where there were 2.08 million Hispanic votes in 2004, and 2.96 million in 2008 (which is 21% of all votes in California). (This rapid gain dovetails with the sudden pro-Obama shift in many of California’s red districts.)

Percentage-wise, this gain is nothing compared with the gain in Georgia, though; although Hispanic votes are only 3% of the vote there, they shot up from 26,000 to 128,000 votes from 2004 to 2008. Overall, this has to be seen as good news for Democrats — when a group that makes up half of all new voters polls in your favor by a 2-to-1 margin (Obama polled at 67% in exit polls among Latinos).

It’s also worth noting that the 5 million increase also included 2 million more black voters and 600,000 more Asian voters — meaning, if you do the math, hardly any gains at all came from white voters. In terms of age groups, young voters (18-24) were the only group to show a statistically significant increase in voting rates (but they still remained the group with the lowest turnout: 49%).

Conventional wisdom is that the African-American and youth voter numbers seem largely driven by a spike in participation associated with the historic nature of the Obama candidacy, and may be poised to fall off a little in future elections. However, the increasing Latino numbers were also driven partly by increased participation: the voting rate (the percent of persons of that race who voted) among Latinos went up 4%, the same percentage that it went up among African-Americans. It remains to be seen whether Latinos continue to increase their participation rate (their voting rate was still only 49%, compared with 66% for non-Hispanic whites and 65% for blacks). But even if their voting rate falls off, growth among the Hispanic population will still make them a larger and larger proportion of the pool of voters.