Tuesday, CQ-Roll Call Group hosted a forum in the airy Columbus Club, nestled in a quiet corner of Union Station, looking ahead to the 2010 elections. Though billed as an “Early Election Preview” host Taegan Goddard inevitably called upon panelists to comment on next year’s possible path for the campaign trail in light of Election 2009.
Tom Jensen, offered some interesting insight in this vein. Jensen is Communications Director for Public Policy Polling
, the Democratic-based pollsters whose numbers were early indicators of the purpling of North Carolina in 2008. PPP data not only confirmed that the Tarheel State’s 15 Electoral Votes were in play, but that future former Sen. Elizabeth Dole was in danger of being toppled by Democrat Kay Hagan.
in Virginia and disillusioned by Gov. John Corzine’s tenure in New Jersey, they saw neither candidate as a personification of the administration, and weren’t scared into Democrats’ attempts to portray their Republican vanquishers at threats to the president’s agenda.
The numbers support this assertion, even if PPP is avowedly partisan source. In winning Virginia, Gov.-elect Bob McDonnell drew over a half million votes less than John McCain’s losing bid for the Old Dominion’s Electors a year earlier. Based on exit polls published in the New York Times, 2009 Election Day voters favored McCain overall, 51%-43% a year earlier. Jensen noted that that’s a 14 point shift from Obama’s 52%-46% Virginia margin over McCain.
McDonnell was better at keeping Republican in line – probably because he rode the wave of his fellow partisans most agitated over the course of the administration thus far – holding onto 95% of McCain voters. Over twice the number of those GOP apostates – 12% – voted for Obama in 2008, but abandoned Deeds this year. Per these percentages on an overall turnout of 1.985 million, McDonnell drew just over 100,000 Obama voters. Deeds snared about half that number of McCain voters. Both stats represent only narrow slivers of the entire electorate.Of those fabled self-identified independent voters that were reported to be McDonnell’s key to victory, the exit poll reported they constituted 30% of voters, and they went two to one for the governor-elect. That means just under 400,000 self-ID’d independents voted Republican and just under 200,000 voted Dem. These numbers dwarf those found to have actually acted “independently” and chosen McCain-Deeds or Obama-McDonnell. So, these voters who insisted they were “independent,” voted for the same party’s nominee for president in 2008 and for governor in 2009 by a three to one margin, after all.
It might be safer to label them “weak Republicans” or “weak Democrats,” because they probably did split their ticket, likely straying down ballot. In the end, they probably picked one party over the other by a clear majority when you look at all the partisan offices they cast votes for in over the two elections.
So, maybe it really was about turnout, and which candidate could inspire, instead of bore or, worse, alienate, his partisan base.Another panelist, the assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, Peter Brown, maintained that “Virginia is reverting to form,” with the Republican’s statewide sweep this year. In the future, that form may be reverted to more often on the “off-off year” statewide elections that see not only more partisan voters turnout, but more native-born Virginians, too.
Unmentioned was highly mobile lifestyle of voters swelling Northern Virginia, and suburbs around Richmond and in the Tidewater region, too. Not averse to bouncing around the country for work, especially if higher incomes and more generous benefits beckon, many of suburban Virginia’s transplanted denizens feel bound by a weak, if any, bond to the place. A fair share, no doubt, half-expects that they’ll be moving on in a few years. Many just don’t care enough about state politics to bother with fighting through traffic-clogged freeways to stop by the polling place.
This may be even more pronounced among the military families clustered around Norfolk who face the prospect of sudden redeployment. Virginia’s Tidewater-centered 2nd congressional district saw the second lowest ’09 turnout.
Antagonism to the Bush Administration, and a realization that Democrats finally were within reach of Richmond, might explain why some of those voters that stayed home this year did show up and help Mark Warner and Tim Kaine win eight and four years earlier, respectively.
If the 2010 congressional elections are effectively nationalized and these Old Dominion-disinterested voters return, Virginia may “revert” to its 2008 electoral habits. And if they stay home again for 2011’s state legislative election, deferring to longer-term residents, look for results to “revert” to those from 2009.
If there is a trend for Virginia, it’s neither “red” nor “blue,” an ever evolving purple.
