I’m in London, covering the British election, so I’m not in the perfect position to analyze the turnout in Tuesday’s primaries in Ohio, Indiana and North Carolina. Fortunately, the Hotline has done it for me, and the results are dismal news for Democrats: their voters are just not turning out very much, and Republican voters are.
Interesting subtext: Indiana Republican House incumbents Mark Souder and Dan Burton were renominated with strikingly unimpressive percentages, the Republican candidate in the last four elections in the Indiana 9th district (and the winner in the 2004 general election) Mike Sodrel finished third in his primary and insurgent Marlin Stutzman lost by only a narrow margin to former Senator and Congressman (and Ambassador to Germany and Washington lobbyist) Dan Coats by only a narrow margin in the Indiana Senate primary. All of these data points can be cited in the support of the proposition that there’s a backlash against Republican incumbents as well as Democrats in general. Fair point. But it’s still not a trend that promises to cut for Democrats (who are after all most congressional incumbents) in November.
