Record Voter Interest Likely to Help Obama

Record Voter Interest Likely to Help Obama

July 10, 2008 2:59 PM




Voters are showing record high levels of engagement in this year's campaign, and if that translates into higher turnout, it is something that may favor Democrats whose ranks have shown more enthusiasm than the Republicans, according to a Pew Research Center survey. Pew says that its poll, conducted June 18-29, found that 72 percent of all voters had given "quite a lot" of thought to the election compared to 58 percent in June 2004 and 46 percent in June 2000.

The Democratic "engagement" figure was 77 percent compared to 72 percent for Republicans and 66 percent for independents. A poll released by Pew earlier this month found that when it came to following the campaign closely, Democrats appeared more interested than Republicans by a 52 percent to 28 percent.

Sixty percent of all voters said they were satisfied with the presidential candidates. But only 49 percent of Republicans held that view, raising a question of how solid McCain's base is. In 2000 and 2004, about three-quarters of Republicans described themselves as satisfied. By contrast, seventy-four percent of Democrats were satisfied with the candidates and the number for independents was 52 percent. That's an increase for the Democrats over 2000 and 2004 election.

Pew says that while Obama's lead over McCain is 48 percent to 40 percent (the margin of error is 2.5 percent), he also leads among voters who say they "strongly" back either candidate by 28 percent to 14 percent. Compare that figure for McCain to George Bush in 2004, whose number was 32 percent. Independents are evenly split between the two candidates but 46 percent are undecided, compared to 28 percent at this point of the 2004 campaign.

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http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/polltracker/2008/07/record-voter-interest-likely-t.html