The polling game between likely and registered voters is often yelled about, but in reality during the recent presidential elections the vast majority of registered voters actually cast a ballot (and why systemic voter suppression in minority or diverse populations is so strident). The NBC/WAPO poll is a great illustration of how the press uses the likely versus registered polling to obscure a few things. Basically I could say that 90% of all registered voters will cast a vote this cycle. Whites will do so just under the 90%, African Americans will vote higher and Latino's and Asians in the mid 80's, how can it affect the vote by 5%?
Before I go through the minutia, internals are suggesting that voting participation will be at the same levels if not more than 2008---forget the enthusiasm gap!
Obama and Romney both get 47 percent among likely voters in the latest edition of the poll, conducted entirely in the aftermath of the second presidential debate last Monday. In the last national NBC/WSJ poll, which was conducted before debate season began, the president held a narrow, three-point lead over his GOP challenger, 49 percent to 46 percent.
But among the wider pool of all registered voters in this new survey, Obama is ahead of Romney by five points, 49 percent to 44 percent.
Essentially the difference between likely and registered voters is the difference between active and inactive voters who are registered. Fox News has an interesting and ironic article that over
20 million voters in the US are inactive
In its 2011 report, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission put the number nationwide at nearly 21 million.
The state with the largest number of "inactive" voters is California, with 6,367,117, or 36.8 percent of all state votes. Texas has 1,887,762; Florida, 1,323,288; New York, 1,126,491, and Illinois, 1,087,321.
"Inactive" voters can still vote, but only after confirming their personal information or registering to vote all over again. In the states that require photo ID to vote, they will need to show it.
By definition inactive voters are those who have not voted in two consecutive presidential elections using that particular registration, often inactive voters are individuals no longer living in that state and because there is no system to purge a moved registration from state to state.
NOTE: I checked my Wisconsin registration and I am still on the roles but considered inactive, I moved away from that state in 2005.
Just to give you a basis 20 million voters represents 13% of all registered voters in 2008! Furthermore 89.5% registered voters cast a ballot in 2008 so many of those inactive voters suddenly became active somehow or somewhere.
The reality is that people move and like my registration that is still on the books in WI, it is garbage in, garbage out. I will say that on paper there might be 20 million names that are inactive in one state, but in reality it is far less nationwide. In many ways, this underscores the need for the Federal Government to set standards, non-partisan rules and regulations for voting registrations and their administration across state lines. My thinking is that there is so much redundancy and territorial self-interest that states and clerks are presupposed to lose their power of holding a data record, why not simply streamline the system where on your Federal Tax Return you can have updated voter registration sent to a state via the Census Bureau. This would confirm citizenship through Social Security numbers, address and residencies, and then further confirm it through state income or other revenue residency requirements like drivers license or motor vehicle, property taxes etc. The IRS could simply send citizen information to the US Census Bureau and the Census Bureau could be the clearinghouse for such voter and citizenship information. Any update or change be it a drivers license or what not is then updated to this national clearinghouse and sent to the respective state(s). Then a form is sent out to confirm the change of status to the new address where the person can either send it in or go on line with your FED pin and confirm it. Heck I have a PIN for the IRS, my State income tax and FAFSA, all stuff done online. Heck as of now FAFSA applications are tied to FED tax submissions.
This would be real reform.
But lets try to cut through the noise and crap below the squiggles and get down to the reality.
From the US Census Bureau there is tremendous research available to compare voting by groups.
2008 there were 206M age eligible citizens where 146M were registered or 71%. 131M voters cast ballots, 63% turnout on eligible citizens and 89.63% from registered voters.
2010 there were 210M age eligible citizens where 137M were registered or 65% (note the increase of 4M eligible voters and decrease of 9M registered net 13M degrade). That year 96M voted 45.71% of eligible citizens and 70% of those registered.
Going back to 1996 to 2006;
Presidential election years;
2004 72% of eligible voters were registered and 64% eligible citizens cast a ballot while 88.5 registered voters cast a vote.
2000 had 69.5% of eligible citizens registered, where 59.5% of eligible citizens voted and where 86.5% of registered voters cast.
1996 saw that 71% of eligible citizens registered, 58.4% of eligible citizens cast while 82.3% of registered voters voted.
Off Presidential Years;
2006 67% of eligible voters were registered and 48% turnout of eligible voters and 70.5% of registered voters actually voted.
2002 66% of eligible voters were registered, 46% of eligible voters cast and 69.5% of registered voters actually voted.
Trends, Presidential years there is a range between 69.5% and 72% of eligible voting citizens who register but the percentage of turnout has increased from 82% (1996) to almost 90% (2008), up about 8.4%. While off-Presidential election years see a decrease on registered voters to range of 65% to 67% and a turnout of 69.5% to 71% down 15-22% decrease. (If the Dem's indeed regain the majorities in both legislative houses they will have to find a way to improve the turnout in off election years.)
So looking at the angst of the difference between registered and likely voters is a difference between 10 and 12% of active and inactive registered voters. So how can NBC have such a wide variance of 5% nationally between likely voters and registered voters? Understand that 89.7% of all registered voters cast a vote in 2008 and each presidential election cycle has recently seen an increase of total registered voters ranging from 10% to 4%, where there is ever more participation from all registered voters. These voters have to come from somewhere, white America is not growing and either is African-America to that degree, so where---look out angry white Republican America!
I will submit that I think registered voters participating will go over 90% this year, based on the amount of money spent, ground game sophistication and the decision being so stark, and the trend lines as new voters have a behavior of voting, so likely voters will be at least 9/10 of those registered. Naturally the question is whether in those inactive voter profile is a predominate or determinate demographic for or against President Obama's re election.
Let us look at by gender first, because that is what NBC teased us and compare it to those who voted in 2008: There are 2% more women registered than males, (72.8% to 70.1%) where women hold a 8M plus advantage in overall population and a 9.7M causing the all important advantage in registrations, where 9.7M more women voted in 2008. (Comment, how stupid it is for Republicans to target women issues as they have in the negative---just politically stupid.)
NBC said that Romney leads with men and Obama leads with women. If so Romney would win men 32.17M to 26.11M and Obama would win women 35.91M to Romney 30.27M. In this case Romney would win the popular vote 62.44 to 62.02M or a difference between 402,000 votes. In each segment there appears to be an undecided or undeclared quotient of 4% for men and 6% for women. (This could also constitute the inactive voter quotient, these numbers are the reverse in that historically women vote in greater percentage than men by a factor of 3-4%) If Obama increases a percentage among women by just 1% point he overtakes Romney by 100,000 votes nationwide popular vote. Does this answer why Obama's team has placed a Reagan Star Wars Laser Beam on this demographic and why Romney is backtracking every social issue about women?
Let us look at three other groups starting with age:
Males who are under the age of 24 who are registered voted at 81%, but only 55% of them were registered. Males between 25-44 who were registered 86% voted and 66% were registered. Men between 45-64 who were registered 91.9% voted as 73% were registered and finally those over 65, 92.6% voted as 78.5% were registered. Again between 8/10 and over 9/10 men vote if they are registered.
Women who are under 24 and who are registered vote at 85% and also 62% are registered. Women between 25-44 who are registered 89% vote where 71% are registered. Woman between 45-64 who are registered 93% vote where 76% are registered. And those over 65, 90% vote while 77% are registered. With women it is pretty constant regardless of age, 9/10 vote and have better registration numbers until they reach 65 but in that group it is marginal.
So as our generations age they register at greater numbers, and marginally improve their voter participation until it reaches the national average. Here is an internal polling hint. All those youth voters registered in 2008, most are still registered, though that is where the most geographical mobility is, so re-registration is a chore but internals are showing that those who are registered will participate at numbers consistent with 2008. One major reason, see woman issues!
Ethnicity or race designation
Whites comprise 83% of those who were registered in 2008 and voted that year, while comprising 60% of the population, 72% of whites are registered. This gives you the spotlight of the inactive and unregistered voters and the threat that franchising Latino, Asian and African-American voters is to the white voter monopoly. Whites who were registered voted at a turnout at a rate of 89% or the national average that includes all groups.
Latino's or Hispanics had 19M eligible voters in 2008 where 59% were registered and 84% of them voted. This year the PEW Hispanic Research estimates a growth to 24M eligible voters where if registration remained constant it would represent an increase of 2.8M voters where if 84% voted it would mean 2.32M votes. Polls are showing Obama gathering 67% of this demographic or a gain of 1.46M to 800,000. (Another internals hint; in Colorado, this percentage it is actually much higher reaching numbers close to and above 75%. Furthermore in CO there is a reported 400,000 new registrations above 2008 where in heavy Hispanic Counties voter registration has increased 5-8%. Overall in Colorado as reported by the Denver Post
While Latinos make up about 20 percent of Colorado's population, they are about 12.1 percent of the state's registered voters— up from 9.2 percent in 2008, [up 139,000] according to an analysis by political-opinion research firm Latino Decisions.
That in of itself represents a projected 100,000 new votes.
African-Americans had 24.9M eligible voters in 2008 where 69% were registered and 93% of registered African-Americans voted, better than whites, 92% of them men and 94% women. Comparably speaking there is only a 3% difference between registration of eligible African-Americans and White voters.
The last racial-ethnic group are Asian-Americans. Interestingly they have a lower registration percentage than Latinos, (55%) and comprise 3.9M voters. Again those who are registered vote at level of 86%.
What I am trying to say is that determining likely voters by gender or ethnicity does not move the bar that much, pollsters and activists know that those who are registered will vote about 9 out 10 times, down a bit for Hispanics or Asians but not terribly so maybe 17/20 instead of 18/20.
So what is this telling you. Registering voters is what moves the bar the most. Except for eight states, three that remain battlegrounds, IA, WI and NH where registrations can go up to the day of election. The other states are ID, MT, MN, WY, ME and DC. So all that can be done is Get Out the Vote. Now allow me to place another percentage on you. Self identifying oneself as a party also designates that voting at the top of the ticket is a 90% threshold. So if 90% of those registered vote and 90% of those who are party affiliated vote for the top of the ticket than it the contest comes down to those considered independent (unaffiliated).
Yet in the independent ranks is actually a variable that is well known for years that truly about 22% of the electorate (though harder to determine whether they are registered) those who are truly non-partisan independent. The rest are secretly partisan though they self identified unaffiliated which now is running somewhere between 30-36% of all registered voters in 29 states. In Colorado it is about 35%. But in reality then a significant number of unaffiliated voters are actually aligned with one partisan party. In "The Promising Adolescence of Campaign Surveys," in Campaigns and Elections American Style, Wolfinger research point to this conclusion:
In short, the vast majority of self-defined Independents are not neutral but partisan—a bit bashful about admitting it, but partisan nevertheless. Once this is recognized, the proportion of the electorate that is truly neutral between the two parties is scarcely different now than from what it was in the Eisenhower era. Moreover, because these "pure Independents" now are less inclined to vote, their share of the voting population is, if anything, a bit smaller now than in the 1950s and 1960s.
And that is where the inactive voters are, truly non-partisan Independent or Unaffiliated voters who are registered but less inclined to vote.
I was shown some Obama Colorado internals and for them it appears that if Get Out the Vote efforts are as successful as 2008, Obama will succeed. It will be closer than 2012 as of now but with increased Latino, alongside overall women support, (which there are 100,000 more women voters than men as well) plus the youth and aligned Democratic voters things are stable---as long as votes are cast. It is true that suburban women in southern and western Denver areas is less than 2008, not as much as feared.
Most important is the voter participation by voter registration, it will follow 2008 if not exceed it. This is on both sides.