Why did more Republicans then Democrats vote in FL yesterday?

[DoYouEverWonder]

According to the FL Dept of State, 1,583,351 voted yesterday.

For governor in the Republican Primary -

607,386 voted for Crist

317,996 voted for Gallagher

24,231 voted for other candidates

949,613 = Total Votes



For governor in the Democratic Primary -

394,154 voted for Davis

346,096 voted for Smith

95,993 voted for other candidates

836,243 = Total Votes


The problem with these results is that the FL Dept of State is showing '0' votes for some major DEM counties, therefore making it appear that the Republicans got more votes then the Democrats.

If you look at their voter turnout chart - http://enight.dos.state.fl.us/ you will see that Broward, Leon, and Palm Beach Counties are still showing '0' results.

Is this just a convenient trick to make the Republicans look better, or does it mean that Broward and PB still don't know how to count votes?

[chefgirl]

1. Diebold?

n/t

-chef-

[gator_in_Ontario]

2. I was a poll worker

in St. Lucie county, and the precinct I worked in a FEW more r's than Democrats that voted. I think it is probably an "r" precinct. I know I was the token Democrat at this polling location...sheesh. Had to bite a hole in my tongue more than once. But that is another post altogether...
It was a piss-poor turnout on both sides, actually...sad....

[lpbk2713]

21. Thank you for your service ............... n/t

[fuzzyball]

45. It is indeed sad when Iraqi's turn out more than TWICE as much to vote

than Americans. I guess they value the right to vote more than we do.
SIGH.

[nosillies]

3. No great conspiracy, I'm afraid. More likely they just haven't updated

the chart. If you go to the specific pages for Broward, PB, etc., you'll see results posted.

[DoYouEverWonder]

7. This is the chart that all the news reports are going to hit first

and they will use this info and never notice the problems.

The State should not even put out the chart if they haven't finished collecting the totals from ALL counties.

[onenote]

12. no one is going to "use" these numbers...

The chart (obviously not up to date) that shows zeros for several counties, is a chart showing overall turnout. It does not break down voting by party. The chart showing the results for the Democratic and Republican primaries to pick a nominee for governor show votes from every county and a combined number of votes cast that is larger than the useless "turnout" chart. There is nothing to indicate that the number of Democrats voting in the primary was underreported. The fact that the number of Republicans that voted is higher than the number of Democrats is completely unsurprising given that the Republicans had a US Senate nomination at stake and the Democrats did not.

If you can point me to a single time when the news media has cared about the relative numbers of Republican and Democratic voters participating in a primary I'll be shocked.

Don't need to make mountains out of non-existant molehills.

[DoYouEverWonder]

13. Oh sure, just shut up

and don't dare to look at their data or ask questions. :sarcasm:

The media does report the figures for overall turnout. The State of FL is still showing as of 11:00 AM a total turnout of 15.5% of all registered voters. This figure still does not include Broward and PB Counties which have the largest populations and are DEM counties.

The media also reports the overall figures for turnout for DEMS & REPS and again those figures are very skewed if you use this chart, which is the only source for the official totals. The result is that it appears that the REPS did a better job of getting their voters out then the DEMS did and that will probably turn out not to be true, when the final figures are released.

Publishing accurate figures is important and there is no excuse for FL Board of Elections to still have not updated this chart since it is apparent they do have results from the counties still showing '0' turnout.

If we don't set off red flags now, what happens in November when they pull this crap again?

[onenote]

15. the chart doesn't break out republican and democratic turnout

I don't know what chart you're looking at. The turnout chart simply shows overall turnout. And frankly, if the media reports that overall (i.e. combined Democratic and repub) turnout was 15.5 percent and it really was higher, who the hell cares? What possible difference does it make since it doesn't break out repub turnout separately from Democratic turnout.

As for the fact that the number of votes reported to have been cast in the repub primaries is higher than the number of votes cast in the Democratic primaries -- again, that is not a big surprise. There was a pretty highly visible US Senate primary for the repubs to vote in.

I suspect that the fact that more repubs voted in the primary will in fact be true after the final numbers are released.

[ncrainbowgrrl]

19. Sometimes, primary turnout is weird.

were there any other big races other than governor/senate on the primary ballot yesterday? controversial US house representatives? Persons that the repug party might want to purge from the house in hopes of getting a more conservative person in the seat?

Anything within the state? big house/senate races that will essentially be won by the candidate that wins the primary? in NC, that occurs OFTEN in some statewide house/senate districts...when no one from the other party is running, and a nasty contest erupts between 2 of the same party to be assured of the seat. If something like that is happening in a district, it could EASILY add thousands of republicans coming out to the polls to vote. Ditto if this is happenening on a larger level- like for national house districts!

Again, not claiming to know anything- just wondering...

[DoYouEverWonder]

59. No one is going to "use" these numbers...

Sure, no one will use these numbers -

Experts: Primaries run smoothly, thanks in part to low turnout


Sep 6, 4:57 PM EDT

<snip>

Turnout in Florida primaries has declined since highs in the 1950s and 60s. It was 29 percent in the 2002 gubernatorial primary that included former Attorney General Janet Reno, and 17 percent in the 1998 primary that Jeb Bush won on his way to becoming governor.

Tuesday's preliminary turnout of 15.5 percent was even lower than the 20 to 30 percent that was predicted, although about a dozen counties had yet to report their numbers, according to the state elections Web site Wednesday.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/F/FL_FLORIDA_VOTING_FLOL-?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=STATE&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

[DoYouEverWonder]

60. Here's one that's in a headline

Turnout for primary hits record low of 15.5%

September 6, 2006

For the record, the 2006 Florida primary might yet go down on the record books -- for low interest.

The Secretary of State's office this mornning reports Tuesday's voter turnout at 15.5 percent -- lower even than the 17 percent bottom set in 1998.

The final count of 1.6 million ballots cast should go higher later today. As of 9 a.m., the state elections office still was not reporting voter turnout numbers for Broward and 12 other counties, including Collier.

http://www.tallahassee.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060906/CAPITOLNEWS06/60906005


Of course, no one will use these number.

[madame defarge]

4. Maybe they're saving their energy & gas for Nov. 7. nt

[William769]

5. I love a good conspiracy theory!

To bad thats all it is.

[DoYouEverWonder]

8. What theory?

All I have done is present facts and figures and ask a question about a huge discrepency that happens to make the results look better for the Republicans. That is bull. The State should not even put out this chart until all the totals are posted.

[democrat in Tallahassee]

6. I didn't vote cause I didn't really care which of them won the

gubenatorial primay and I think a lot of people felt the same way.

[Stevepol]

9. How do we know how many voted? How do we know anything

about elections in FL anymore, or GA either for that matter or any other state?

We don't have a democracy anymore because of the way the vote is counted.

[soup]

10. Weather in SE FL

Weather was the biggest hitch with low turnout at the polls
By ALISA ULFERTS, Times Staff Writer
Published September 6, 2006

Some polling places weren't marked clearly, a handful of others opened late and two precincts briefly ran out of paper ballots. But the worst voting glitch Tuesday appeared to be the soggy mess of rain that hugged Florida's lower east coast.

By late afternoon, up to 4 inches of rain had fallen along the coastline of Democrat-heavy South Florida, further dampening what was already expected to be a weak turnout.

The rain sent some candidates who were counting on South Florida votes into a panic.

"With the skies pouring down rain in South Florida, we face a huge risk of people staying home," Paul Neaville, campaign manager for Democrat gubernatorial hopeful Rod Smith, said in a blast e-mail Tuesday afternoon. "We're asking you, please: if you have a car and an umbrella, get out there and vote."
more:
http://www.sptimes.com/2006/09/06/State/Weather_was_the_bigge.shtml

[DoYouEverWonder]

14. Weather has nothing to do with

accurately reporting numbers that you already have collected.

As of 11:00 AM the State of FL still has not revised this chart. There is no excuse. They already have totals from the counties that they are still showing '0' returns.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

16. It was pretty messed up all around. The Miami Herald print edition

showed Guttierez winning State Rep, when actually he didn't even come in at second place. And this is a huge race closely watched down here because the past state rep retired, and he was big in Jeb's pocket, and we were waiting on pins and needles to see who would run against our candidate, Ron Saunders, who is unopposed in the primary.

[gator_in_Ontario]

53. As I mentioned above, I was a poll worker

Our precinct was at a motel...back by the pool. And we only had one sign...I'm sure folks that had not voted there before had a hard time finding it. I also saw on the news that some polling places (PB county I think) were in gated communities and folks could not get past the guardhouse...sounds appropriate :sarcasm:

[sandnsea]

61. What kills me about that

is the number of people who just rail against mail-in because of the supposed potential for fraud and it's so important to get to the polling place - yet the biggest problem we keep having is getting our people TO these obscure polling places. Aargh.

[soup]

11. self delete

NEVER MIND! I'M AN IDIOT. THAT'S THE STATE TOTALS --- JUST SHOOT ME NOW

Do I leave this post to show how dumb I am, or self-delete? decisions, decisions...

[autorank]

17. Leon County didn't have it's totals up; look at Broward...

Very large and prosperous county, check out their web site.

http://www.browardsoe.org/Election.aspx?eid=7

This is an excellent post. There is no excuse at all, this far along, to not have up vote counts.

Yes, the Democrats had many more voters because three large counties are not
posted. I checked Leon, nothing for primary 2006. You check Broward above.

This is the type of garbage that goes on all the time, yet on electing eve in these counties people claim victory and people concede defeat. It's the election
version of Potemkin Village.

[onenote]

18. I'll try again to explain this

Broward and Leon Counties' votes are included in the totals for the individual races. Check,for example, http://election.dos.state.fl.us/Elections/ResultsArchive/Enight.asp

There is no indication that the total number of voters reflected in the individual primary race totals are inaccurate. Yes, the turnout chart is inaccurate because it has no data from several counties. But (1) it doesn't break out Democratic and repub totals separately and (2) once the totals are included, it may shift the total turnout higher, but it may not be by very much. For example,contemporaneous reports about the voting in Broward County indicated that, in part because of the weather,and in part because of the proximity of the election to Labor Day, turnout was low -- less than 15 percent. That's consistent with the combined number of votes reported in Broward for the Democratic and repub primaries. (In Leon, it looks like turnout was around 30 percent, which will push the overall turnout total higher.)

Should the voter turnout data be updated? Of course. But the incomplete data isn't going to do any meaningful harm. It simply shows low overall turnout and, I suspect, when all is said and done, the final numbers also will show low turnout (maybe not as low, but still pretty low).

[autorank]

20. Regardless..

The collection and posting of this data is not a difficult task. It is misleading, just as you said, to see the totals as you presented them unless you know that the counties you mentioned are excluded and you are familiar with counties in Florida.

The collection and presentation of election data is not that hard. It is something that happens in similar form daily with large national chains and there are many more "candidates" (i.e., products) to track. There's really not one excuse imaginable for Leon and Broward to not have their primary results up, at least in a way that's easy to find (I just went to elections and clicked on 2006 or "latest" - nothing).

[DoYouEverWonder]

28. Once the DEM strongholds are included in the count

the stats will change significantly.

'Incomplete data isn't going to do any meaningful harm'. Why should we even bother to have elections any more? Let's just coronate Bush and get it over with.

[onenote]

30. once they're included the turnout total will be around 20 percent

rather than 15.5 percent as originally posted. That's it. Nothing else. Nothing about repub v. Democratic turnout. No change in the vote totals in the individual primaries. Nothing.

BTW, the turnout in the Democratic strongholds wasn't so great. In Broward, it appears to have been around half the statewide level (around 10.3 percent); in Palm Beach, around 13.5 percent. Gilchrist and Lafayette probably will check in with higher percentages (35-40 percent) but they don't have a lot of voters to begin with. And Duval, the last county not posted, is not exactly a Democratic stronghold: more repubs voted than Democrats, which is consistent with Duval results from prior elections.

Again, while it was dumb to post a turnout percentage when the results were incomplete, it really is much ado about nothing.

[DoYouEverWonder]

31. When it turns out that more DEMS voted then REPS

we should charge the State of FL with fraud? But of course, you will find all sorts of reasons why we shouldn't question their motives.

[onenote]

37. why do you think that is going to be the case?

I don't know why this seems so difficult for you to understand. In your original post you contrasted the total number of voters participating (without party ID) as reported on the "turnout" chart, with the number of votes cast in the Democratic and repub primaries for governor. The problem with drawing that comparison is that while the turnout number was incomplete in that it showed no votes from several counties, the votes from those counties WERE included in the totals for the Democratic and repub gov. primaries.

As it turns out, the numbers for the various races weren't final either. THey continue to increase by small margins. In the last couple of hours, the vote totals for the various candidates in the gov. primaries in Broward have increased slightly. And the totals statewide for the gov's primaries have increased. But not in any relation or proportion to the supposed missing counties. At the time of your first post, you reported 836,243 votes in the Democratic primary for governor and 949613 in the repub primary. The current numbers are around 851, 975 (around 15,000 more) and 979437 (around 30,000 more). That certainly has nothing to do with Broward County...its just numbers from slow-reporting precincts all over the state.

There is absolutely nothing to suggest that the number of Democrats voting in the primary has been understated. And there is no reason for anyone to do that. No one gives a rat's ass what the turnout by party is in a primary. No one, apparently, except for you. I previously asked whether you could point me to any instance in which anyone has bothered to write about the relative turnout of the repub and Democratic parties in a primary. Still waiting.

The reason I'm not questioning "their motives" is because (a) I don't think anything has happened that is worth questioning and (b) because I can't fathom any motive for doing what you claim has happened (but can't provide any evidence in support).

The reason this matters? Because real vote fraud can and does occur and crying wolf and making claims that make no sense actually hurts the effort to point out the real fraud when it occurs.

[onenote]

33. 4:30 pm update

The voter turnout numbers have now been further updated to add Broward, Gilchrist,and Duval Counties, leaving only Lafayette and Palm Beach missing. While the chart doesn't show the revised turnout percentage, it works out to around 18-19 percent. I still predict that when Palm Beach and Lafayette are added, the total will be around 20-21 percent.

Now, can someone explain the significance of the difference between a statewide turnout of 15 percent and 20 percent when there is no breakdown of turnout in repub v. Democratic "strongholds"?

[DoYouEverWonder]

34. You have to look at the individual races

to figure out how the turnout was split.

I am basing my figures on the governor's race, since that was one of the few statewide races. The statewide race for US Senate with Katherine Harris would not be a fair comparison.

[onenote]

35. you'd need to know the registered voters by party

and that's not part of the chart you seem so concerned about, or the charts for the individual races.

So tell me again, what exactly is the big deal?

[DoYouEverWonder]

36. This was a primary

You can only vote for your own party.

Therefore the vote totals correlate directly with party affiliation.

[onenote]

38. HUH?

Alright, we know the following:

In Broward County, approx. 73,200 votes were cast for Democratic candidates in the governor's primary and a total of 116,270 votes were cast in the two primaries out of the 997,174 total registered voters.

Now tell me, what percentage of the registered Democrats voted in the primary.

[DoYouEverWonder]

40. So that means that in Broward County

73,200 voters were for Democrats. Only 31,747 for Republicans

However according the statewide totals 949,613 Republicans voted for governor, while only 836,243 Democrats voted for governor.

By excluding the totals for the large DEM strongholds the numbers are significantly skewed. The talking airheads on the M$M will use these numbers tonight to convince the public that the Republicans didn't do so badly yesterday.

Sure looks like the DEMS kicked ass in Broward compared to the REPS. No wonder FL didn't want to include those numbers.

[onenote]

43. HUH again?

What numbers were excluded? You've just told us something that has been available on the elections website from the very beginning. As I keep trying to tell you, the number of votes cast in the gov. primary by Democrats in Broward County was available and included in the 836,000 plus total at the time of your original post.

To use a current example: in the turnout chart, the total number of votes cast in Palm Beach has not yet been recorded. But in the information for the gov. primary for the Repubs and Democrats, the Palm Beach data is listed. So out of the 851,000 plus Democratic votes now reported as having been cast in the gov primary, we know that around 68595 were from Palm Beach Democrats and out of the 979000 plus votes in the repub primary, 35 580 were cast in Palm Beach. Big deal. THat info is there even though the turnout total doesn't include Palm Beach. When the turnout total is updated, the votes in the gov. primary arent' going to change (they may change slightly if there are still some precints that haven reported, but it will be marginal at best).

Why is this so hard for you to understand. There is no relationship between the information in the turnout chart and the information reported either statewide or county by county in the gov. primary races. The fact that more Democrats voted in Broward than repubs is hardly surprising. Broward is a Democratic stronghold so one would expect a higher Democratic vote total there, just as you would expect a higher repub total in Duval, which, at the time of your original post, also was not yet included in the turnout chart.

Nothing was hidden. Nothing shrouded in mystery.

[DoYouEverWonder]

42. Something else funny that I just notice

They have updated the totals for the Governor's race.

However the updated total for the DEMS doesn't even add up to the total DEMS that voted in Broward.

At 8:00 AM these were the totals


For governor in the Republican Primary -

607,386 voted for Crist

317,996 voted for Gallagher

24,231 voted for other candidates

949,613 = Total Votes



For governor in the Democratic Primary -

394,154 voted for Davis

346,096 voted for Smith

95,993 voted for other candidates

836,243 = Total DEM Votes


1,785,856 = Total Votes

At 6:00 PM these were the totals


For governor in the Republican Primary -

627,148 voted for Crist

327,446 voted for Gallagher

24,843 voted for other candidates

979,437 = Total REP Votes



For governor in the Democratic Primary -

403,544 voted for Davis

350,570 voted for Smith

97,861 voted for other candidates

851,975 = Total Votes

1,831,412 Total Votes

The problem that I see is that just in Broward Co. the DEMS picked up 73,200 in the governor race. Yet the State total only shows an overall increase since this AM of 15,732 more votes for the DEM governor.

Does this look right to you? God I miss TIA right now.

[onenote]

44. Broward was always in the count

Good lord. You really can't be this obtuse. When the statewide total was 836,000 plus, that included around 70,000 votes from Broward. As additional precincts reported, the numbers were updated,both in the county totals and statewide. So the Broward number is up to 73,000 and th statewide number is up to 851,975. The numbers in other counties also have increased.

[DoYouEverWonder]

47. I wasn't addressing you

I was asking autorank a question, thank you.

[onenote]

50. You certainly enjoy keeping your head in the sand

But hey, whatever floats your boat.

[onenote]

22. update

The turnout page has been partially updated. As of 2:30 (east coast time), the turnout totals for Leon County have been added (leaving five counties unreported). Also, the total turnout percentage number has been deleted.

Looking at the numbers from the missing counties, it appears that when the final numbers come in the total turnout will be around 20 percent, which is still pretty low.

[onenote]

23. delete - dupe

[Tiggeroshii]

24. Some of those counties have close to a million registered voters.

It would be quite a statistical phenomenon for nobody to show up to the polls.

[DoYouEverWonder]

25. Here are the totals from the Broward & PB Counties websites

Broward County

Governor - Republican

Charlie Crist (REP) 69.74% 22,141
Tom Gallagher (REP) 27.41% 8,701
Vernon Palmer (REP) 1.58% 502
Michael W St Jean (REP) 1.27% 403

Total = 31,747

Governor - Democrat

Glenn Burkett (DEM) 2.45% 1,771
Carol Castagnero (DEM) 3.58% 2,588
John M. Crotty (DEM) 1.27% 920
Jim Davis (DEM) 49.15% 35,573
Rod Smith (DEM) 43.56% 31,527


Total = 72,379

-------------------------------------


Palm Beach County

Governor - Republican

Charlie Crist 64.59% 23,626
Tom Gallagher 32.84% 12,014
Vernon Palmer 1.44% 527
Michael W St Jean 1.13% 413

Total = 36,580


Governor - Democrat

Glenn Burkett 3.79% 2,600
Carol Castagnero 3.56% 2,442
John M. Crotty 1.22% 835
Jim Davis 43.38% 29,759
Rod Smith 48.05% 32,959

Total = 68,595

[Tiggeroshii]

26. Very good!

Where is this from?

I hope they update this soon...

[DoYouEverWonder]

27. The figures are from the individual county's websites

They have been up all day.


http://www.browardsoe.org/enrsummary.aspx?eid=27

http://enr.clarityelections.com/default.aspx?eid=29

[seafan]

29. On the local news from Miami about 2 hours ago, they reported

that Davis received more votes (in Broward Co.?) than all the Repub candidates combined. I like to ruminate on that!

You post's info seems to confirm that to be true for Broward:

Broward County

Governor - Republican

Charlie Crist (REP) 69.74% 22,141
Tom Gallagher (REP) 27.41% 8,701
Vernon Palmer (REP) 1.58% 502
Michael W St Jean (REP) 1.27% 403

Total = 31,747


Governor - Democrat

Glenn Burkett (DEM) 2.45% 1,771
Carol Castagnero (DEM) 3.58% 2,588
John M. Crotty (DEM) 1.27% 920
Jim Davis (DEM) 49.15% 35,573
Rod Smith (DEM) 43.56% 31,527


Total = 72,379

[DoYouEverWonder]

32. Even Rod Smith beat Crist in Broward

by a lot.

[El Fuego]

39. Maybe Palm Beach and Broward haven't certified the count yet

It might take longer because they are among the most populous counties.

I live in Palm Beach County, and I voted!

[DoYouEverWonder]

41. Nobody has certified anything yet

These are all initial counts. I don't even know if all of them include the absentee ballots, which so many people have switched to. There is no excuse for omitting figures that have been available all day on the county's websites and are not update on the state's site

[justinrr1]

46. Florida "Democrats"

Even though there are more registered democrats in florida than republicans many of these so called democrats are conservatives that switched over with Reagan. That might explain some of the voter turnout.

[DoYouEverWonder]

48. That is not the issue

The issue is that the table put out by the State this AM, excluded the large DEM counties even though those counties had posted results on their websites. Therefore the data, even if incomplete, was available and the State for whatever reason did not include it until much later today. That is the issue.

[justinrr1]

49. Absentee Ballots

I did hear of some counties that had problems with their absentee ballots and therefore reported 0 % precints b/c none of them were complete. However I would not put anything past my state as far as trying to mess with the counts.

[DoYouEverWonder]

51. Yes, there still seems to be a problem in Palm Beach

However, the State results have a disclaimer that:

UNOFFICIAL ELECTION NIGHT RETURNS
(may not include absentee or provisional ballots)


So that shouldn't have prevented them from posting the election day votes, like they did for other counties.

[onenote]

52. nah, that's not the issue

I hope you don't mind my butting into your dialogue with DoYouEverWonder (I'm fairly confident he won't like it but I'm not talking to him I'm talking to you).

There is no issue. The state has one chart that shows, without breaking it down by party, the total voter turnout by county and statewide. There are separate tables that show the vote totals in each of the races, both statewide and by county. This morning, the tables for the individual primaries had the then current vote info for each race. In the case of the Democratic and Repub primaries for governor, these tables showed votes from every county in the state. However, for reasons that aren't clear, the turnout table didn't include all of the counties. Originally, it showed a total percentage that clearly was wrong since it included in the denominator the total registered voters (without distinguishing between parties) for each county, but didn't have the number of votes cast in some of those counties included in the numerator. Later in the day, the turnout chart was updated, adding in some of the missing counties and deleting the misleading statewide percentage total. As of the last time I checked, there were still two counties (Lafayette and Palm Beach) that still hadn't been recorded. But the votes from those counties in the individual primaries were counted in the tables for the individual races.

Bottom line: the turnout chart was misleading when it suggested statewide turnout was 15.5 percent when it didn't include several counties votes in the numerator. THe final number probably will be around 20 percent. But nothing was hidden or not reported in terms of the actual primary races. In other words, there is no "there there" as far as some big controversy.

[PresidentWar]

54. Because more Republicans than Democrats vote in general

Something that we have a real hard time coming to grips with, and correcting.

[DoYouEverWonder]

57. The numbers posted by the State of FL are incomplete

there is no way to know who had a better turnout. The State is withhold the counts from the DEM strongholds until late this afternoon and even then the numbers don't add up.

We can't tell you really had a better turn out because of the State's fooling around.

[Ignacio Upton]

55. Several reasons:

1. Republicans had more of a motivation to vote yesterday. There were competitive Congressional primaries and State Legislative races. The Senate race was also high-turnout, because Harris had to spend a lot of get fellow Republicans to turn out for her. The other half of the voters in that race came out to vote AGAINST her. In contrast, Democrats didn't have as many contentious primaries, as Bill Nelson wasn't even on the ballot because he didn't have a challenger, and because Congressional and legislative races didn't have the level of contentious races as the Republicans.

2. I heard that it was POURING in southern Florida. That might have depressed turnout down there.

3. I hate to admit this, but Republicans tend to be more motivated to vote in lower key elections, such as primaries.

[DoYouEverWonder]

56. You're missing the point

The point is that the State of FL deliberately omitted the totals from the counties with large DEM populations.

The 2nd point is that their numbers don't add up and don't make sense.

It is very likely that more DEMS turned out then REPS but the State is skewing the numbers to make it look the other way around.

Sorry if I was clearer in the OP.

[onenote]

58. you're still wrong

numbers from several counties were not included in an initial report (not broken down by party) of turnout. But numbers from those counties were included in the vote totals for the various primaries.

It is quite clear, and not horribly surprising, and completely irrelevant, that fewer Democrats came out to vote on primary day when the repubs had both a governor's race and a US Senate race, but the Democrats only had the governor's race to attract voters statewide. The numbers from the large Democratic counties, like Broward, show that turnout was lower in those counties than in some other counties, also possibly because of the weather.

[Lochloosa]

62. The correct answer to your questions is obvious

This was a primary election. There were several local contest that did not have any democrats running or had no competition.

In my district (5 in Jacksonville) the only vote I could cast was for Governor.

We have a closed primary system in Florida. You cannot vote outside of your party.