Question on Washington's primary results

[patriotvoice]

Let's put the Washington primary results in perspective. Below are the total number of primary votes in 1992, 1996, 2000, and 2004:

1992: 147,981
1996: 98,946
2000: 475,709
2004: 23,282

Why were there so many less votes this year? Well, further research led to these:

Washington's presidential preferential primary, formerly scheduled for March 2, 2004, has been cancelled by action of the Washington Legislature and Governor (House Bill 2297, signed into law Dec. 9; visit the Washington State Legislature web site for the text).

http://www.secstate.wa.gov/elections/presidential_primary.aspx

Caucuses are meetings of Democrats in your precinct to discuss issues and vote on candidates for president. Voting begins at 10:30 AM and ends no later than 11:00 AM. You can then leave, or stick around for further issue discussion.

http://www.wa-democrats.org


Can anyone comment (preferably Democrats in Washington) on why the voting window was only 30 minutes?

For information on my data sources, see my 2004 election model:
http://www.ideacode.com/~bishop/home/2004/election%20forecasting.xls

You never ever could win a war;
that's what you have to learn.
Here everybody is a loser;
you will get nothing in return. -- Funker Vogt

[Madrone]

1. I'm a WA dem, but can't answer your question.

What I find curious is that everything I heard was talking about RECORD turnout in WA for the caucus. That doesn't jibe with your numbers.

I don't get it either.

[Madrone]

3. I don't think the numbers for this year are correct.

I just added up all the delegate votes given with CNN's 99% reporting, and it totals: 22,742.

The number of total primary votes you have shows: 23,282.

I think you are looking at DELEGATE votes, not the total number of votes cast in the primary.

I think I saw someone here post that 1 delegate vote = 50 votes.

[patriotvoice]

7. Yes, it appears to be caucus-only.

However, the allocation formula is not simple:

Delegates and alternates to the legislative district caucus (or county convention) shall be apportioned among the precincts based on a the following formula:
a.In precincts which have the same boundaries as in November of 2000, each precinct shall elect one (1) delegate and one (1) alternate for each fifty (50) votes or portion thereof cast for Al Gore in the 2000 general election.
b.In precincts where the boundaries have changed since November, 2000, or where two (2) or more precincts cast their votes in such a manner that the votes cannot be accurately apportioned between the precincts, each precinct shall have one (1) delegate and one (1) alternate for each one hundred and seventy- five (175) registered voters or portion thereof within the precinct as of January 1, 2004
http://www.wa-democrats.org/del_guide.doc

There is a 95 page spreadsheet that gives the breakdown, but not being from Washington, I am at a slight disadvantage. I have an email to the President of the Washington Democrat's to get full figures.

Also, yes, I had two numbers swapped. Thanks for catching my dyslexia.

[patriotvoice]

9. Assuming that every precinct has the minimum # of delegates...

... then Washington had a total turnout of at least 1,137,100 and yes, that would be a record for them.

[dsc]

13. We have no idea how many votes a delegate represents

and it depends on where the delegate is from. Each precinct gets a set number of delegates depending upon how many people in that precinct voted for Gore in 2000. Thus large, heavily Democratic precincts get more delegates than small, heavily Republican ones. That is without regard to how many people actually show up to vote. Thus, to take a ridiculous example Precinct A in Seatle has 20 delegates assinged to it and Precinct B in Walla Walla has 5 assigned to it. If 100 people show up in both then a delegate in Seatle will represent 5 people while one in Walla Walla will represent 20. In real life the numbers work out better but there are still going to be discrpencies.

[MurikanDemocrat]

2. That can't be right. That's got to be a typo

[JailForBush]

4. Washington is One of the Most Corrupt States

It's tightly controlled by corporations based in the Seattle area. This corporate clout, combined with its population, makes Seattle Washington State's de facto capital. The biggest players include Microsoft and Boeing, both of which have rained enomrous havoc on local government, public education and society in general.

The plutocrats are obviously working hard to scuttle democracy in Washington State. As you noted, they cancelled this year's primary. They also scuttled our blanket primary system. (I think that's the term.)

I've run for public office three times. The first time, I attended about half a dozen public forums. I heard corrupt candidtes talking about forums they'd attended that the rest of us had never even been told about. When I ran for STATE office the next year, I didn't attend any forums at all - there were none.

Campaign 2003 may have been the most sensational in Seattle history. The manipulation was simply unbelievable. The thugs who were "elected" may not be any worse than past thugs, but the media tirelessly promoted this absurd story that an angry public voted in a crop of "activists." Activists, my ass. New Seattle School Board Vice President and Green Party whore Brita Butler-Wall and new Seattle City Council member David Della, among others, couldn't reform their way out of a paper bag.

Bill Gates and his partner in crime, Paul Allen, continue to tighten their grip on Seattle. Paul Allen is probably the city's biggest land owner. He wants to transform his land into a biotech center, and I believe Bill Gates is going to be part of it. Allen bankrolled last year's charter school initiative, while Bill Gates is leading the charge this year. Gates is also increasing his influence in Washington, D.C.

And Seattle's stupid liberals don't even realize (or care) what's going on. The sad state of Seattle is a lost cause. Or very nearly so.

[Democrats unite]

6. I knew Bill Gates would get drugged into this somehow!

[JailForBush]

10. He's kind of hard to ignore when discussing influential Washingtonians.

Especially when you pair him with his partner in crime, Paul Allen, and that other high-tech Republican fan, Craig McCaw.

[baby_bear]

11. I'm tired of you calling us liberals as stupid, JailForBush

I am a proud liberal Seattleite and I work every day to make this a better place to live.


You come across as a curmudgeon. Why don't you join with us in the energy for positive change? Your attitude helps nothing and nobody.

s_m

[JailForBush]

12. You've got it backwards.

I've been fighting the "Education Mafia" for nearly a decade, and I've never found anyone - liberal or conservative - interested in joining in. In all honesty, I fear your "energy" would only drag me down; I'm not really referring to you personally, but to Seattle "liberals" in general.

Why is it that no candidate for public office (except me) ever makes the corporate media a campaign issue? Why am I the only candidate who made Bill Gates a campaign issue? I don't think I was literally the only candidate who blasted George W. Bush last year, but I don't think anyone else attacked him in the Voters Pamphlet. I don't need that kind of "energy for change."

[baby_bear]

5. It's not obvious, I know

This is the first year we did a caucus-only Dem primary. So there were fewer people, but it still was a good turnout. That is a separate discussion though. Some people were disenfranchised who may have voted in a ballot primary in earlier years.

The voting started at 10 am. By 11 am everyone present was required to have made their preference made formally in writing. At that time, the people still present, from the precinct, who had voted for a candidate who had received less than 15% in that particular precinct were given the opportunity to switch votes to a candidate who had more than that. For example, in my precinct, Clark had less than 15% so some people who initially signed up as Clark supporters switched to Kerry, Dean, or another. In the end, in my precinct, 3 delegates went for Kerry and one for Dean.

I have a good friend who is a Clark supporter and she felt bad about changing her vote away from Clark to Kerry, after the fact.

It's not something we are familiar with here in Washington yet. And to tell the truth, the delegates from this state still have to go through county and legislative procedures before all is decided. Nevertheless, yesterday's results are relatively indicative of how this state is going, delegate-wise.

s_m

[stromboli]

8. democrat terrorists

The only logical explanation is that all the democrats in washington state have been arrested for treasonous plots against the country by supporting a non-republican candidate. I'm pretty sure one of the provisions of the Patriot Act allows this.

[maxr4clark]

14. "primary" votes?

I'm a Democrat in Seattle, Washington. The number you gave, about 23,000, is roughly the number of delegates that were being elected in the Democratic precinct caucuses this year. I haven't a clue what the 1992, 1996, and 2000 numbers you gave represent, but they do not represent the number of delegates elected by the precinct caucuses, and therefore are not comparable to the number you gave for this year.

I have heard that the turnout for the Democratic caucus this year was about 200,000, and that it was a record; the caucus organizers at my precinct in Seattle said there were at least twice as many attendees per precinct there than there had ever been before. The personal reports I have heard from caucus goers from the fringes of the suburbs around Seattle said that there was a more typical turnout for the caucuses there; many of the precincts did not have as many people turn up as there were delegates to assign, so anyone who was willing to be a delegate in such a precinct would win a delegate for the candidate they support.

Dean didn't win Washington because Dean's support was in the Seattle precincts, where there were 10 or more people per delegate, and Kerry's support was evenly spread throughout the state. If Washington had held a primary instead of a caucus, I have no doubt that Dean would have won Washington--and that Clark would have placed above Edwards, as well.

This is the second time I have attended a caucus in Washington; the first time was in 1992. I have come to the conclusion that caucuses are a horribly biased way to choose a candidate, and I will be active in trying to get Washington to do primaries in the future. I would recommend that Washington Dean supporters do the same.

[jono]

15. Apples and Oranges

First, it appears your figures for the 1996 and 2000 state primaries are way off. This is what I found at the Secretary of State's website:

Date Held: February 29, 2000
Registered Voters: 3,147,603
Total Ballots Cast: 1,340,921
Percent Turnout: 42.6% Percent Voting Democratic Ballot: 23%
Percent Voting Republican Ballot: 37%
Percent Voting Unaffiliated Ballot: 40%
http://www.secstate.wa.gov/elections/election_2000summary.aspx

Date Held: March 26, 1996
Registered Voters: 2,898,010
Total Ballots Cast: 691,420
Percent Turnout: 24% Percent Voting Democratic Ballot: 15%
Percent Voting Republican Ballot: 18%
Percent Voting Unaffiliated Ballot: 67%
http://www.secstate.wa.gov/elections/election_mar261996summary.aspx

Second, the numbers for this year are for caucus delegate votes, not primary election results (since we didn't have a primary this year). Each of those 23,000 caucus "votes" is a delegate who represents several people, so the turnout is actually much higher:

The caucuses at more than 550 sites brought out a record number of voters, as many as 200,000 Democrats, state party Chairman Paul Berendt said.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2001853413_caucus08m.html

I don't know exactly what turnout has been for caucuses in the past, but that article calls it "record" for caucuses, and I heard that turnout at my location was nearly triple what it was in 2000. We've always had caucuses, longer than we've had a primary if I'm not mistaken. You can't compare the turnout between a primary and a caucus, because it's the difference between about a million and about a hundred thousand.

The reason the "voting window" at a caucus is only 30 minutes is because it's essentially a meeting of neighbors rather than a balloted vote. Everyone declares their initial preference ("undecided" is an option), then you have 30 minutes for discussion. At the end, you re-count to see if anyone has switched positions, and you have the chance to negotiate to try and win delegates.

[patriotvoice]

16. Figures

The figures are accurate. First, they are from the FEC, which I implicitly assume to be accurate. They also match the figures from the links you post (which reinforces my assumption about the FEC). Second, my spreadsheet figures only concern Democrat votes, not Republican, et. al.

[SadEagle]

17. AFAIK, WA switched Primary -> Caucus for delegates

To save $$$$. And of course caucuses have a lot less turnout.

[jono]

20. They didn't switch.

Yes, they cancelled the primary to save money ($6 million). But they did not switch to a caucus; caucuses have always been held in addition to the primary. Most WA delegates have always been assigned through the caucuses (had the primary been held this year, it would've determined only 15% of the delegates).

[Name removed]

18. Deleted message

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[woofless]

19. Up here in Whatcom county

we had 6 precincts at one caucus location. At the last caucus (2002) three people showed up. This year there were ninety-three. In our tiny precinct 20 people voted on the distribution of 4 delegates. I do not know the figures but it is commonly held that this year there was record participation statewide.

Woof