Democratic Voter Turnout...Honestly

GOP Turnout has consolidated, entrenched, intensified and stalled

Republican growth in this state has slowed tremendously in Georgia over the last decade and has actually decreased relative to Voting Age Population in Presidential Elections and is flat in gubernatorial years.

Consider

• The net change in GOP Turnout over the last four years was a scant 30,000 votes.
• The good news is that 75% of that growth was in the Bedroom Counties of Cherokee, Forsyth, Hall and North Fulton. A good bit of that growth was people moving out of the core Atlanta counties rather than migration from out of state.
• 81 counties actually saw a net decrease in GOP votes in 2012 compared to 2008; effectively zeroing out the gains made in those four North Atlanta Counties.
• Another 41 counties (primarily rural) had an increase of less than 250 comparing Romney vs. McCain.
• In the 31 reliably Democratic counties, that provide about half of the Democratic Electorate (with the exception of Fulton which is a special case), only four counties saw any increase in GOP turnout amassing just 551 new votes between them.
• In Cobb and Gwinnett, once suburban stalwarts, there were fewer than 2,000 new Republican votes in 2012 despite 30,000 new registered voters over the four year period. And while those 31 Counties contributed just over half of Democratic Vote totals, these two “Republican Stalwarts” gave the next 25% of the Democratic state totals.

At the same time, we are seeing both anecdotally and empirically greater resolve among “Older white men.”. But we are also seeing another trend in comparing 2008 and 2012. In Republican leaning precincts, white female vote totals were down by 105,000 (about 10%) among those who voted in 2008 in spite of the overall vote being down by just 23,500.

We are seeing increased primary competition on the GOP side in statewide and statehouse races (evidenced obviously by the 2012 US Senate race to replace Saxby Chambliss) and a growing divide between the Libertarian/Tea Party wing and the more moderate establishment wing of the state GOP.

All this is good news, but it is not enough to win elections. Democrats took a small step back in 2012, and while they came down from what might be considered stratospheric numbers in 2008, or our vote deficit increased by some 50,000 votes. We need to understand why we are trending in the wrong direction.

A Fresh Look at the  Democratic  Firewall

Our ability to win statewide election is determined largely by our performance in about 25% of Georgia’s 159 Counties.

There are 31 counties (Tier I & Tier II) which went Democratic in each of the last three General Elections and 26 of those went Democratic the last four cycles. These counties contributed between 49 and 52% of the statewide Democratic total in each of the last 7 election. 94% of the most reliable Democratic precincts can be found in these Counties. Practically all of the Democratic members of the both the State House and Senate hail from these counties.  

This is the Democratic Firewall.

These 31 counties fall into two tiers. Tier I are the ten core counties in the top 6 metro areas in the state. These 10 Counties account for about 48% of state Democratic totals; the other 21 counties we always win but account only for a solid 3% of the Democratic totals.

There is a third group of counties, we either won in 2012 or we got a significant vote total (about 392,000) and contribute about 23% of democratic totals.

Distribution of Democratic Vote
 by County Tier

The remaining 26% of Democratic totals (462,000) come from either very GOP stronghold counties or very rural counties making up the rest of the state. While each of Georgia’s 159 counties is obviously important to our statewide totals, our most reliable Democratic counties present both out greatest opportunity and our greatest challenges in closing the gap in 2014.

12 years ago, these Tier I and Tier II counties represented 37% of the electorate. Today, they represent 35.83%. A small decrease to be sure. But these 31 counties have a voting population of 2.75 Million Adults, only 2.1 Million are registered and only 1.36 Million of those voters got to the polls in 2012.

These are not GOP voters who somehow forgot it was Election Day.

There are serious problems in our most Democratic Counties with both registration and GOTV efforts that have to be understood and corrected if we are going to win ANY statewide races.

These are not simple issues. There are  difficult  Party bylaws issue and looming turf  battles protected  by organizational and operational  minefields that will be  hard to avoid.  Our challenges with voter turnout particularly in a post-Obama environment ought to be at the heart of  every discussion among Party  and elected officials.  

Some of us  have been having this discusson in a Facebook group  for the last four months and there is a groundswell of  support to bring  new vitality and  Vigor to this issue.    Please consider joining  the conversation.

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