A Reminder About GOP Absentees

As of yesterday, 301,024 Republicans had turned in absentee ballots in Florida and another 288, 025 had voted early.

Rudy Giuliani's campaign tried to collect absentees early -- before voting started. They were moderately successful, according to the campaign's tracking. Since Giuliani's core pool of supporters is said to overlap with McCain's, McCain is said to be at a disadvantage here.

Mitt Romney's campaign tried to collect absentees late. Initially, they hoped that Romney victories in Iowa and New Hampshire would boost their efforts. Whoops. BUT -- victories in Michigan and Nevada and Wyoming and Romney's enduring viability probably helped their collection.

Comments

The SurveyUSA results suggest that the early votes almost mirror the actual votes. Up until today's poll, Romney had a slight lead, so some of this is probably small sample size float.

There's a question of what share of the electorate votes early ... the polls say one in four, but I have no way to gauge that. The fewer poll voters there are, the better for Romney I would imagine, since he had the resources to get out the vote while McCain didn't.

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot | January 29, 2008 10:40 AM

Okay, if your figures are right, that means the polls suggest almost 1.8 million voters will vote at the polls in the GOP primary, for a total of 2.4 million votes. That would mean turnout in Florida, as a share of the public, would 33% higher than South Carolina, even though South Carolina is a more Republican state where campaigns had stronger field operations. That strikes me as implausible. Call somebody in the FL SoS office and see if they can get you early voter/poll voter ratios for previous elections.

The fewer poll voters, the better it is for Mitt Romney.

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot | January 29, 2008 10:52 AM

Okay, here we go, In 2006, 1.54 million people cast early or absentee votes, while 3.38 million voted at the polls. That suggests there will be another 1.29 million poll voters, for total turnout around 1.8 million, which would be roughly equivalent to South Carolina turnout.

SurveyUSA polls actually showed McCain with the early vote lead up until 1/25. Since 1/25 and on, it's been a tie, and there's been basically no variation between early voters and poll voters.

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot | January 29, 2008 10:59 AM

But isn't it safe to say that most Republicans will vote today? That still won't help Rudy to the top.

http://www.political-buzz.com/

Posted by matt | January 29, 2008 11:01 AM

Rudy would need a win, and not the distant 3rd place he's headed for (and that might be optimistic) to stay in the race. Say goodbye, because Rudy is history.

Mitchell Polling, which has been very accurate this year, has Mitt ahead by 2 points. Public Policy Polling has him up 7 points. Datamar actually has him up by 12 points. But there are a slew of polls that have him down by a point or two, or have it tied. My guess is that he will win by 3 or 4, based on a superior GOTV organization. It will be exciting.

Posted by Dave | January 29, 2008 11:22 AM

Hello, Marc-

One of the biggest wild-cards in a race that is already too close to call (according to every public poll) is the existence of not only absentee ballots but early voting. It would seem that Rudy would do disproportionately well in early and/or absentee voting than what he will do at the polls today. That difference could very well determine the margin of victory for either Mitt or McCain today.

Also, what about military ballots? I speculate that they would break heavily for McCain...

Posted by ElectionNightHQ.com (McCain site) Publisher | January 29, 2008 4:05 PM