{"id":40802235969,"date":"2013-08-08T12:53:00","date_gmt":"2013-08-08T16:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/2013\/08\/08\/booker-and-mail-voting-could-be-golden-opportunity-for-dems\/"},"modified":"2021-01-25T11:22:05","modified_gmt":"2021-01-25T16:22:05","slug":"booker-and-mail-voting-could-be-golden-opportunity-for-dems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/2013\/08\/08\/booker-and-mail-voting-could-be-golden-opportunity-for-dems\/","title":{"rendered":"Booker and Mail Voting Could be Golden Opportunity for Dems"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cross-posted at\u00a0PolitickerNJ<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

He won\u2019t be on the ballot in November, but if Cory Booker wins the US Senate nomination he could still boost turnout for vulnerable Democratic legislators in the regular general election. New Jersey\u2019s automatic vote by mail provision provides the answer.<\/em><\/p>\n

Tuesday was the deadline for mail ballot applications in the special primary election to fill the U.S. Senate seat left vacant by Frank Lautenberg\u2019s death.\u00a0There have been some rumblings that county organizations would make a special effort on behalf of Newark Mayor Cory Booker to increase his vote-by-mail total.\u00a0 That didn\u2019t seem likely.\u00a0 The local parties backed Booker precisely because they don\u2019t have to put any resources into his race.\u00a0Their war chests are needed to protect Democratic legislators in the face of a Chris Christie tsunami in November.<\/p>\n

The data available on mail ballot applications for next week\u2019s primary bear out that no effort has been made to sign up voters on Booker\u2019s behalf.\u00a0 However, there is one fascinating blip on the radar screen that points to how local Democrats can use Cory Booker\u2019s senate run to their advantage.<\/p>\n

Some background.\u00a0 New Jersey has had universal vote-by-mail access since 2009.\u00a0 That is to say anyone can vote by mail prior to Election Day without needing to provide a \u201cvalid\u201d absentee excuse.\u00a0 In addition to signing up for a specific election, the application also allows voters to select automatic mail ballots for every remaining election in the current calendar year and\/or for every general election in ensuing years.<\/p>\n

New Jersey voters haven\u2019t really taken advantage of this option.\u00a0 In the 2012 general election, 7.7% of votes cast were submitted by mail ballot.\u00a0 This is only slightly higher than the 6.3% of ballots that were cast absentee in 2008, before the universal mail ballot law went into effect.<\/p>\n

It also appears that the vote-by-mail option is more likely to be exercised by Republican leaning voters.\u00a0 In New Jersey last year, the highest mail proportions of the vote were reported by Hunterdon (12.4%), Cape May (12.0%), Somerset (10.8%), Ocean (10.6%), and Gloucester (10.3%) counties.\u00a0 Trailing in the vote-by-mail effort were Essex (5.1%) and Hudson (3.5%) counties.\u00a0 In fact, fewer than 2% of the total ballots cast in the cities of Newark and Jersey City were submitted by mail.<\/p>\n

Past experience shows that if a voter requests a mail ballot, there is a 9-in-10 chance it will be returned.\u00a0 In other words, if Democrats sign up some of the unlikeliest voters (e.g. urban residents, younger adults) to vote by mail, they can increase turnout among their base.\u00a0A big push on early voting was a major component to Pres. Obama\u2019s success in swing states last year.<\/p>\n

New Jersey Democrats haven\u2019t caught on to that \u2013 except in one place \u2013 Camden County.\u00a0Consider the fact that the Camden County clerk received 16,525 mail ballots in the high turnout 2012 presidential election.\u00a0That translated to 7.3% of the total county vote, which was on par with the statewide average.\u00a0Fast forward to today \u2013 Camden County has nearly 13,000 ballot requests for next week\u2019s primary!\u00a0 In an election which will see only a fraction of last November\u2019s turnout!<\/p>\n

These voters, though, did not come out of the woodwork for Cory Booker.\u00a0Even before Sen. Lautenberg\u2019s death and the announcement of the special election, Camden County had 12,159 voters signed up to receive ballots for every remaining election this year.<\/p>\n

Nearly 4% of registered Camden County voters are already slated to receive mail ballots in both the October and November elections.\u00a0 The next highest totals are Cape May County and Ocean County at just over 1% each.\u00a0 No other county tops 1%.\u00a0\u00a0[Note: analysis based on preliminary mail ballot data as of July 26 for 17 New Jersey counties.]<\/em><\/p>\n

There will almost certainly be a skew in partisan turnout between the two fall elections (see the June\u00a0Monmouth University Poll (June 13, 2013)<\/a>\u00a0for more detail on anticipated turnout).\u00a0 Some Democratic voters may vote in the Senate election but stay home for an apparent losing gubernatorial effort in November.<\/p>\n

This has some legislative Democratic incumbents worried.\u00a0 And rightly so.<\/p>\n

Take Gloucester County for example.\u00a0 It is home to Democratic Senate President Steve Sweeney, but the county will almost certainly produce a sizable gubernatorial majority for Republican Chris Christie.\u00a0 Sweeney and his running mates will need to attract a lot of split-ticket voters or boost turnout among registered Democrats.<\/p>\n

The Gloucester County clerk, though, has only received about 1,800 requests for mail ballots, with approximately 100 of them coming since the special election was announced.\u00a0 Just over half (55%) of those ballots are being sent to Democratic voters while 37% are going to Republican voters. \u00a0That\u2019s a tighter margin than in neighboring Camden County, where the ballot split is 57% Democrat and 21% Republican.\u00a0 In fact, two-thirds of the Camden County mail voters who have signed up in just the past two months are registered Democrats.<\/p>\n

By all accounts, the Booker campaign is generating a good deal of enthusiasm among young voters and urban voters.\u00a0It doesn\u2019t look like the county party organizations have taken advantage of that yet.\u00a0 Even Camden County Democrats have yet to fully capitalize on the Booker effect.\u00a0 Nearly 30% of their new mail voters have signed up only for next week\u2019s primary.\u00a0That means party operatives will have to go back to those voters to get them to re-up for the fall.<\/p>\n

Cory Booker\u2019s candidacy presents Democrats with a unique opportunity to offset Gov. Christie\u2019s coattails in November.\u00a0 That will only work, though, if they make an all-out effort to sign up mail voters before October.\u00a0 And don\u2019t forget to check the \u201call general elections\u201d box on the application.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cross-posted at\u00a0PolitickerNJ He won\u2019t be on the ballot in November, but if Cory Booker wins the US Senate nomination he could still boost turnout for vulnerable Democratic legislators in the regular general election. New Jersey\u2019s automatic vote by mail provision provides the answer. Tuesday was the deadline for mail ballot applications in the special primary […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":939,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40802235969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40802235969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/939"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40802235969"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40802235969\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40802244176,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40802235969\/revisions\/40802244176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40802235969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40802235969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/polling-institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40802235969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}