Democratic registration is outstripping Republican registration significantly in the swing states.
In three key battleground states, Democratic voter registration is outpacing Republican voter registration by a significant amount.
In North Carolina, over the past three weeks, we can see that Democratic voter registration has begun to accelerate more than Republican voter registration:
Report of 9/8/2012
Dems +2,485 Reps +2,056
Report of 9/15/2012
Dems +4,248 Reps +2,983
Report of 9/22/2012
Dems +8,612 Reps +4,281
As one can see, as of this past week, Democrats were outpacing Republicans more than two to one in voter registration.
As of the latest report, there are 2,778,535 registered Democrats and 2,008,609 registered Republicans out of 6,454,075 total voters. The corresponding percentages are 43.1% and 31.1% for a Democratic advantage of exactly twelve percentage points.
But how does this compare with 2008? Well, going back to the report of 10/4/2008, which is the closest match I could get, we see that Democrats had 45.39% of registered voters to 32.51% for the Republicans for an advantage of 12.88%. That Democratic advantage swelled to 13.8% by election day. So we are probably a little behind where we were in 2008, but we still have two full weeks before we can make a direct, apples-to-apples comparison with the first week in October from 2008.
Another thing to consider is that diversity among the North Carolina electorate continues to increase. As of the 10/4/08 report I mentioned, white voters made up 74.4% of the electorate, while black voters made up 21.06% of the electorate, Hispanic voters made up .98% of the electorate, and "Other" (could be Asian, since there is no Asian distinction given, or decline-to-state, or multi-racial) made up 1.6% of the electorate. Currently, as of the 9/22/2008 report, whites make up just 71.89%, black voters make up 22.14% of the electorate, Hispanics make up 1.6% of the electorate and the "Other" designation has shot up to 5.1% of the electorate. Thus, we can see that the North Carolina electorate has clearly become more diverse since 2008.
Here is a link to the NC website: http://www.ncsbe.gov/...
Regarding Pennsylvania, Democrats have been just trouncing Republicans in voter registration all year long. There hasn't been one single week where Republicans have registered more voters than Democrats and we have frequently outpaced the Republicans one a two to one basis.
Let's look at the last three weeks for Pennsylvania, as we did with North Carolina:
Report of 9/3/12
Dems +4,650 Reps +3,027
Report of 9/10/12
Dems +6,318 Reps +3,739
Report of 9/17/12
Dems +9,521 Reps +5,558
Unlike North Carolina, Pennsylvania keeps running totals for the year on voter registration. In 2012, 344,851 people have registered as Democrats, 247,653 people have registered as Republicans, and 199,599 people have registered as Unaffiliated/Independent. That corresponds to 43.54% Democrat, 31.27% Republican, and 25.20% Unaffiliated/Independent for a 12.27% registration advantage for the year. And if the current trend holds, that advantage should actually increase as we get closer to election day.
Currently, Democrats have a statewide registration advantage of 50.13% to 37.15% which is almost exactly thirteen percentage points. Thus, Democrats are roughly maintaining the same proportion of Democrats to Republicans among new registrants. I will keep an eye on this and see if the trend continues or changes. In 2008, by election day, Democrats had about a 14.1% registration advantage, so it will be interesting to see if we get back up to that level before election day for 2012.
Here is a link to the Pennsylvania website: http://www.dos.state.pa.us/...
Nevada is another state which merits our attention. At the close of registration for the 2008 election, Democrats accounted for 625,134 or 43.21% of total voters in Nevada while Republicans accounted for just 513,629 or 35.51% of total voters in Nevada. Then, the percentage of Democratic voters fell over the next couple of years, but in 2012 there has been a steady increase once again. Nevada updates its voter registration statistics monthly, so let's take a look at the last three months:
Report of June 2012
Dems +5,568 (578,434 for 42.16% of the electorate)
Reps +2,631 (478,026 for 34.84% of the electorate)
Report of July 2012
Dems +5,390 (583,824 for 42.14% of the electorate)
Reps +3,013 (481,039 for 34.72% of the electorate)
Report of August 2012
Dems +7,094 (590,918 for 42.16% of the electorate)
Reps +2,976 (484,015 for 34.53% of the electorate)
Thus, we can clearly see that the trend for Democratic voter registration in Nevada is positive and the trend for Republican voter registration there is somewhat lackluster.
Here is a link to the Nevada website: http://nvsos.gov/...
In my next update, which will come in two weeks, I will be including Colorado. Democrats took a hit there in terms of voter registration after the 2008 elections, but it looks like we are rebounding a bit there as well.
UPDATE
Someone downthread asked for Florida numbers. The numbers are not great, but they are looking up a bit from July to August.
As of the primary closing of July 16th, the numbers were as follows:
Dems 4,581,056
Reps 4,137,890
This represents an uptick of 74,037 for Republicans since January and only a 27,493 increase for Democrats since January.
But as of August, here are the numbers:
Dems 4,627,929
Reps 4,173,177
This represents an increase in 46,873 for Democrats and 35,287 for Republicans just over the past few weeks. I will keep a close eye on this and provide an update in a couple weeks.
As a sidenote, I talked a friend of mine in Florida into registering for the first time. He is a first-generation Cuban American who is voting for Obama. Yay!
Here is a link to the Florida numbers: http://election.dos.state.fl.us/...