[EL] Iowa Turnout

[Doug Hess]

Some thoughts/questions on the IA turnout (from a native of the tall corn
state):

1. Is it generally true that when the public perceives an election to be
close that turnout rises? If so, was that the case in IA? The press
coverage I heard...well, ok, NPR (hi, Overby!)...seemed to portray it as
"too close to call", etc.

2. What about diversity in choice, is that believed to boost increased
turnout? Assuming moderates in the GOP generally support Romney (Huntsman
provides an alternative for those voters to Romney, but he didn't really
run in Iowa), it seems there was a range of candidates for non-moderates to
pick from. That is to say: Santorum, Paul, and Romney seem to
have little in common. Perhaps no more than what campaigns in the past have
had, but it does seem a crowded field.

3. Unrelated to the above: that the candiates outside of the top three got
29% of the vote, which might be an interesting indication of diversity
itself, you wonder how much of that adds up to anti-Romney votes. One can
imagine a gulf between Paul supporters and others, but how does the 15%
that Perry and Bachman received breakdown for Romney and Santorum? If the
trend runs against Romney, is the real data from the caucus spelling bad
news for Romney?

Doug

============
From: Michael McDonald <mmcdon at gmu.edu>
To: law-election at uci.edu
Cc:
Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2012 03:21:23 -0500
Subject: [EL] Iowa Turnout
I posted the turnout numbers here:
http://elections.gmu.edu/Turnout_2012P.html
There are a total of 122,255 votes in the Republican caucus according to the
Google data table provided in partnership with the Iowa Republican Party and
the Democrats report "more than 25,000" people turned out for their
caucuses.
The Google site reports the Cain and Roemer votes, too. Cain's 54 votes and
Roemer's 31 votes are more that the 8 vote victory margin. One of the things
that is perplexing me is that there are 252 votes unaccounted for when all
the candidate votes are tallied...Write-ins? Uncommitted?
My take is that participation in the Republican caucus kept pace with the
population growth of the state over the past four years. Furthermore, as a
likely consequence of an uncontested Democratic nomination, the entrance
polls report that this year independents comprised 23% of caucusgoers while
four years ago they constituted 11%. Thus, there appears to be a small dip
in enthusiasm among Republicans compared to 2008. Perhaps the Tea Party
enthusiasm from 2010 has run its course, so Republicans should not count on
a replication of 2010 conditions in 2012. Still, overall levels of
participation remain elevated, so if there is a retrenchment in turnout from
the high 2008 levels, there is no indication of a wholesale collapse. Of
course, Iowa is only one state with a caucus system. The upcoming primaries
may provide better indicators and we have a lot of territory to cover before
November.
============
Dr. Michael P. McDonald
Associate Professor, George Mason University
Non-Resident Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution
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