The first poll for the District’s Democratic primary opens a week from Monday. It’s the first time the city has allowed early voting and the two leading mayoral campaigns are taking a “fundamentally” different approach to the election as a result.
Registered Democrats can begin voting on Aug. 30 at Board of Elections and Ethics in Judiciary Square. That will be the only poll open until Sept. 4, when four others scattered around the city will open their doors. Voters can cast their ballot at any polling center, regardless of what ward they live in.
“This is fundamentally different,” said Mayor Adrian Fenty’s campaign spokesman Sean Madigan. “We literally have two weeks where we can engage getting out the vote and our approach will be completely different as a result.”
D.C. Council Chairman Vince Gray’s campaign is looking at it in the same light.
“This creates an entirely different dynamic for the elections,” said Gray campaign spokeswoman Traci Hughes.
The campaigns have been checking names off for months, categorizing them as in favor of their candidate, opposed or undecided. Starting Aug. 30,
they’ll start putting that information to use by knocking on the doors of voters who their campaigns are certain will vote for their candidate. In some cases, they’ll then give them rides to the poll.
The Fenty campaign has hinged its success on getting voters to the polls.
As of last week, the campaign was sitting on a war chest of nearly $2 million and many of the Fenty advertisements that will roll out over the next three weeks were paid for before the Aug. 10 finance reporting deadline. Fenty has hired D.C. voting strategist Tom Lindenfeld to head up his legions of door knockers, Madigan confirmed.
Lindenfeld played a key role in helping Fenty win every precinct in the city in 2006, and Team Fenty is hoping for a repeat performance.
And although Gray outraised Fenty at a rate of more than two-to-one during the summer, his piles of cash are far smaller. Hughes said they’re relying on a mix of paid campaign staffers directing unpaid canvassers who will pound the pavement.
The biggest “wild card” in the early polling is the number of undecided voters, said political consultant Chuck Thies.
A poll released Wednesday found that about 20 percent of voters remain undecided.
“A large percentage of undecided voters always complicates an election,” said Thies, who is working on Ward 1 Councilman Jim Graham’s campaign. “In the end, some undecided may chose not to vote. Many that do, will likely break for [Gray].” Challengers typically pick up undecided voters at a rate of two-to-one compared with the incumbent, Thies said.
The task for Gray, then, is to make sure they vote.
Hughes said the campaign will be sending out direct mailing to better inform voters of Gray’s positions that are meant to persuade voters to do just that.
