In looking at the early voting numbers in North Carolina, I’m struck by a few things. First, voting is up among all groups, which is not what most people would have expected. As a general rule, higher voter participation is good for the Democrats. Throughout the year conservatives have frequently questioned the polls under the assumption that 2012 would have much lower turnout than the pollsters were assuming based on 2008 models. While all things may not be equal (polling hours, for example), after five days of early voting there are no signs of depressed turnout. In fact, the evidence suggests that turnout will be higher this time around.
Second, in 2008 blacks made up 22% of the North Carolina electorate. So far, they are 35% of the early voting electorate. In fact, if I am reading this correctly, 12,000 more African-Americans have voted in North Carolina than have white registered Republicans.
Third, it looks like about 55% of early voters are women and that about 60% of those women are registered Democrats. Those are two numbers that should concern Team Romney because, in combination, they suggest that left-leaning women are pretty fired up about voting in this election.
Fourth, and this is the only bad news, Monday was the first day that the Democrats didn’t exceed their numbers from 2008, but Republicans and unaffiliated voters stayed above the 2008 watermark. This could be a blip, or the first indication of a problem.
I’m not willing to sign off on MattTX’s methodology, but he presently estimates that Obama has banked a 93,000 vote lead in the Tarheel State. But, remember, he only won the state by 14,000 votes the last time around.
I think it’s important to look at these number for more than just what they can tell us about North Carolina. They seem to prefigure a high turnout election, much like 2008. We are still seeing the Democrats show much more enthusiasm than the Republicans for early voting, but the advantage hasn’t necessarily increased; there are just more voters on both sides. In any case, what we’re seeing in North Carolina is encouraging for what it tells us about the state of the race.
