interstices

Governor Otter’s Re-election bolstered by areas of increased voter turnout

We will be putting out some more information about the 2010 election in Idaho in the coming days, identifying some underlying dynamics that appear to have affected final tally of votes (not the results - they were never in doubt).  

Voter turnout in 2010 was flat when compared to the 2006 midterm election.  The 459,079 votes cast in the election was only 152 more than 2006 even though there are 25,000 new registered voters.  A turnout of 500,000 votes would have kept pace with recent midterm election turnout rates.

Even though the total vote was flat there were differences in turnout at the county level, including four counties that were 11 to 20 percent higher than four years ago. We found that among the 44 counties Governor Otter’s improvement in percentage of vote grew roughly in proportion with an increased percent change in turnout.  At the same time he also increased his share of vote in many counties where voter turnout percentages dropped (those are the data points left of the vertical zero line) although not as much.

Statewide there was virtually zero percent change in voter turnout while Gov. Otter’s votes indicate a percent change increase of about 13 percent (from 52 percent to 59 percent of the vote).  Most of the counties with an increased voter turnout rate were in the 1st Congressional District (yellow data points) where twelve of the 19 counties were positive.  In the 2nd CD there were eight of 26 counties with an increased percentage in voter turnout.  Ada County is counted in each district.  This difference in turnout between the two districts is understandable because the contested race was in the 1st District.  It’s in many 1st District counties where Otter appears to have derived a greater benefit in increased voter turnout. 

The Governor’s worst performance shows up in a half-dozen counties where voter turnout percentages actually dropped in the last four years.  These counties are in southeast Idaho.  In fact, there are about ten counties that consistently fall about eight to ten percent lower in support for Gov. Otter, through which one could draw a parallel regression line.  This pattern gets some additional comment in a future post.

Otter’s best performance was in Shoshone County, which had a percent increase in voter turnout of about four percent, but the Governor improved on his percentage of votes by more than 50 percent - it’s the lone data point above the 50 percent line. Shoshone County is a long-time Democratic stronghold and Gov. Otter garnered only 37 percent of the vote in 2006 so there was tremendous upside available that he achieved in 2010.  In fact, most of the data points floating farthest above the regression line are the traditionally Democratic voting counties, places where Jerry Brady carried in 2006 but where Otter made significant inroads and winning all but two.