DATA TABLE TO ACCOMPANY “Count WHOSE Vote”

 

COLUMN #

 

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

Date

state

%dem

% clinton dems

% obama dem

ttl votes

ttl clinton

ttl obama

ttl clinton - obama

ttl dems

ttl clinton dems

ttl obama dems

ttl dems clinton - obama

8-Jan

NH

54%

45%

34%

287322

112,251

104,772

7479

155154

69819

52752

17067

26-Jan

SC

73%

28%

57%

532227

141,128

295,091

-153963

388526

108787

221460

-112672

2-Feb

AL

82%

40%

58%

543074

226,454

302,684

-76230

445321

178128

258286

-80158

2-Feb

AZ

78%

52%

42%

446098

228,158

191,681

36477

347956

180937

146142

34796

2-Feb

AR

78%

74%

25%

309506

217,313

80,774

136539

241415

178647

60354

118293

2-Feb

CA

80%

57%

38%

4434533

2,306,361

1,890,026

416335

3547626

2022147

1348098

674049

2-Feb

CN

80%

50%

48%

353515

164,831

179,349

-14518

282812

141406

135750

5656

2-Feb

DE

83%

42%

54%

96341

40,751

51,124

-10373

79963

33584

43180

-9596

2-Feb

GE

77%

32%

67%

1054831

328,129

700,366

-372237

812220

259910

544187

-284277

2-Feb

IL

79%

36%

63%

2016316

662,845

1,301,954

-639109

1592890

573440

1003520

-430080

2-Feb

MA

65%

58%

41%

1254537

704,591

511,887

192704

815449

472960

334334

138626

2-Feb

MO

73%

50%

47%

823280

395,287

405,284

-9997

600994

300497

282467

18030

2-Feb

NJ

78%

56%

42%

1119768

602,576

492,186

110390

873419

489115

366836

122279

2-Feb

NM

87%

51%

47%

149098

73,105

71,396

1709

129715

66155

60966

5189

2-Feb

NY

87%

60%

37%

1748833

1,003,623

697,914

305709

1521485

912891

562949

349941

2-Feb

OK

78%

58%

30%

417096

228,425

130,087

98338

325335

188694

97600

91094

2-Feb

TN

76%

57%

39%

618723

332,599

250,730

81869

470229

268031

183389

84641

2-Feb

UT

63%

47%

49%

124307

48,719

70,373

-21654

78313

36807

38374

-1566

9-Feb

LA

83%

38%

57%

384348

136,959

220,588

-83629

319009

121223

181835

-60612

12-Feb

MD

84%

40%

59%

777675

285,440

464,474

-179034

653247

261299

385416

-124117

12-Feb

VA

70%

38%

62%

979712

347,252

623,141

-275889

685798

260603

425195

-164592

 

totals

78%

50%

47%

18471140

8586797

9035881

-449084

14366877

7125083

6733091

391992

12-Feb

DC

100%

24%

75%

113746

27,326

85,534

-58208

113746

27299

85310

-58010

 

totals

78%

49%

47%

18584886

8614123

9121415

-507292

14480623

7152382

6818401

333981

29-Jan

FL

79%

52%

35%

1725264

857,208

569,041

288167

1362959

708738

477035

231703

 

totals

78%

50%

46%

20310150

9471331

9690456

-219125

15843581

7861120

7295436

565684

15-Jan

MI

79%

60%

36%

593837

328,151

237,762

90389

469131

281479

168887

112591

 

totals

78%

50%

46%

20903987

9799482

9928218

-128736

16312713

8142599

7464323

678276

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Super Tuesday

78%

52%

45%

15509856

7563767

7327815

235952

12165143

6303351

5466434

836917

Through Super Tuesday

78%

51%

45%

16329405

7817146

7727678

89468

12708823

6481957

5740645

741312

Thru Sup Tues +FL+MI

78%

51%

44%

18648506

9002505

8534481

468024

14540912

7472175

6386568

1085606

 

Notes

“% dems” (Column 1), “% Clinton dems” (Column 2), and “% Obama dems”(Column 3)  are based on the answer to the CNN exit poll under “Vote by Party ID”.  The three choices were “Democratic”, “Independent”, and “Republican”.  In most cases, this data can be found on the third page of each states exit polling data, which can be accessed from the CNN Election Central homepage (http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/ )  Because no exit poll data was available for the District of Columbia, the table assumes that all voters in the Democratic primary would have answered “Democratic” to the “Party ID” question. 

 

“Ttl Votes” (Ttl = total) (Column 4), “ttl Clinton Votes” (Column 5) , and “ttl Obama votes” (Column 6) are based primarily on the data found that can be accessed from the Washington Post Election Guide Results page (http://politics.nytimes.com/election-guide/2008/results/index.html ) because their results included all candidates, while the CNN data does not.  In certain cases, however, CNN had more complete numbers for Obama, Clinton and occasionally other candidates– in those cases, the CNN numbers were used, an “ttl Votes” was adjusted accordingly.

 

Michigan vote totals were assigned assuming that all uncommitted voters would have voted for Obama.

 

“Ttl Clinton-Obama” (Column 7)  is the difference in the raw vote totals between Clinton and Obama. (Column 5 minus Column 6) A positive number indicates a state where Clinton had more votes, a negative number indicates that Obama received more votes.

 

“Ttl Dems”(Column 8) is based on the percentage of all voters who identified themselves as “Democratic” to the “Party ID” question  (% dems)  (Column 1 times Column 4)

 

“Ttl Clinton Dems” (Column 9)  and Ttl Obama Dems”(Column 10)  is based on the respective percentages of Clinton and Obama voters among those who identified themselves as “Democratic”.  (Column 2 times Column 8, and Column 3 times Column 8, respectively)

 

“Ttl Dems Clinton – Obama” (Column 11) is the difference in the extrapolated Democratic vote totals between Clinton and Obama. (Column 9 minus Column 10) A positive number indicates a state where Clinton had more votes, a negative number indicates that Obama received more votes

 

In the total rows, the whole numbers are the sum of the votes in that category. “% Dems” is the sum of the “ttl dems” divided by sum of “ttl votes”.   “% Clinton Dems” and “% Obama Dems” is the sum of “ttl Clinton Dems” and “ttl Obama dems” respectively, divided by the sum of “ttl dems”.

 

Caveat – the numbers for Democratic voters are, by necessity, inexact, insofar as they are based on whole number percentages.  But because the rounding errors should balance out, the projected numbers themselves represent what should be a close approximation of the actual voters – assuming that the exit polling data is reasonably accurate.

 

Finally, the totals here difference from those put out by MSNBC at http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/02/13/661146.aspx for three reasons

1)    I assigned all the “uncommitted” votes from Michigan to Obama.  MSNBC assigned them to “others.”  It should be noted that a separate exit poll question asked if all the candidates were on the ballot, who would they have voted for.  46% said Clinton (vs 55% who did vote for Clinton) and 35% said Obama (vs 40% who voted “uncommitted).   One can assume that Obama’s overall totals would have decreased slightly less than Clintons if these totals had been used.  I chose to use 55%-40% because there was exit polling data relevant to party affiliation for those numbers.

2)    MSNBC included numbers from the caucuses in its totals.  However, those numbers reflect delegates to countywide (or similar) caucuses, rather than actual participation.  Moreover, the method of determining the number of delegates assigned per local caucus varies widely between states – and sometimes, between counties in the same state.    Finally, caucuses are in no way a reliable indicator of overall support for a candidate  -- rather, they are a reflection of the effectiveness of a candidate’s “ground game”.  (e.g. Obama received 79% of delegates of county caucuses in Idaho.   It is inconceivable that, in a Democratic primary election in Idaho, he would receive 79% of the votes cast.)  For all these reasons, only data from states that held primary elections are included in this data.

3)    MSNBC’s numbers are based on less complete returns than the data that I used.