Help interpreting NC vote count

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superrific

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I'm violating my own rule about "don't look for meaning in the early vote" but this isn't quite about that. Rather, there are some questions prompted by looking at that count. First, here's the link to NC early voting data.


1. I was intrigued by GOP claims that men are voting more than they did in 2020, given that I had seen that women were voting more than they did in 2020. And it turns out both are right! So far, women have been 51.92% of the early vote (up from 50.4% of total vote in 2020), and men 41.82% (up from 41.4%, so the XX/XY gender gap is even bigger now than total vote in 2020). So how is this possible? Almost 9% of registered voters are "undesignated" by sex. And they turned out about halfway between XX and XY turnout in 2020. But this year, so far, undesignated turnout is sharply down. That's how both men and women can be gaining.

SO -- what does "undesignated" mean? Trans? Didn't check the box on the form (which I thought was required in many places, maybe not NC)? It seems too big to be trans . . .

2. Race. White voter turnout is lower relative to black turnout so far than in 2020 total results. Yet white votes are a higher % of total votes. That's because "other" is really dropping the ball. Who is other? It's not Hispanics -- they are addressed under the "ethnicity" framework. According to the 2020 results, "other" includes Asians, biracial, Am Indian, "other" and "undesignated." There were very few Am Indians in the total vote (35K voters, or 0.6% of the total), but maybe even less turnout so far? I assume Am Indians are predominantly Lumbee. Do they vote early?

Asians was also a small category (70K votes statewide in 2020) and "two or more races" was much smaller than I anticipated (only 28K in the state; I guess the one-drop rule still lives). So the "other" category is predominantly "undesignated" and . . . "other." Over 100K votes from "other" in 2020.

Any ideas as to who "other" refers to, if not Asians, Am Indians, Pac Islanders (340 total votes in 2020), Hispanics, Blacks, bi-racial, or white? And what about undesignated? I've noticed no spot for Arabs. I know there are some government databases that still count Middle Easterners as white for demographic purposes, but they don't see themselves as white so maybe that's the other category? Also, what about Jews? Is it possible some of them consider themselves to be "other"?

Whoever "other" is, they are so far doing a bad job of voting.

3. What does the ballot actually look like re: RFK Jr? I ask because "We The People" have gotten 379 votes, for a 30% turnout. This is obviously of no consequence for the election, but I'm curious. How does one vote We The People? Are they even on the ballot with a candidate? Should we assume those 379 votes are probably going to the GOP (not that it matters)?
 
superrific said:
3. What does the ballot actually look like re: RFK Jr? I ask because "We The People" have gotten 379 votes, for a 30% turnout. This is obviously of no consequence for the election, but I'm curious. How does one vote We The People? Are they even on the ballot with a candidate? Should we assume those 379 votes are probably going to the GOP (not that it matters)?
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That doesn't mean that RFKJr/We The People has gotten 379 votes, that means that 379 voters registered with the We The People Party have voted.

There is no We The People candidate on the ballot since RFKJr was successful in his lawsuit.

I'm guessing that Trump got at least 375 of those votes.
 
SnoopRob said:
That doesn't mean that RFKJr/We The People has gotten 379 votes, that means that 379 voters registered with the We The People Party have voted.
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Yes, I know. I'm just curious -- can you vote at all for We The People for president?
 
superrific said:
Yes, I know. I'm just curious -- can you vote at all for We The People for president?
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No. One can’t - it’s not on the ballot.

Democrats, Republicans, Greens, Libertarians, Constitution, and Justice for All (Cornel West) are on the ballot.
 
I would definitely not assume Lumbee is the main/only native tribe/voting block. Cherokee nation is strong.
 
superrific said:
2. Race. White voter turnout is lower relative to black turnout so far than in 2020 total results. Yet white votes are a higher % of total votes. That's because "other" is really dropping the ball. Who is other? It's not Hispanics -- they are addressed under the "ethnicity" framework. According to the 2020 results, "other" includes Asians, biracial, Am Indian, "other" and "undesignated." There were very few Am Indians in the total vote (35K voters, or 0.6% of the total), but maybe even less turnout so far? I assume Am Indians are predominantly Lumbee. Do they vote early?

Asians was also a small category (70K votes statewide in 2020) and "two or more races" was much smaller than I anticipated (only 28K in the state; I guess the one-drop rule still lives). So the "other" category is predominantly "undesignated" and . . . "other." Over 100K votes from "other" in 2020.

Any ideas as to who "other" refers to, if not Asians, Am Indians, Pac Islanders (340 total votes in 2020), Hispanics, Blacks, bi-racial, or white? And what about undesignated? I've noticed no spot for Arabs. I know there are some government databases that still count Middle Easterners as white for demographic purposes, but they don't see themselves as white so maybe that's the other category? Also, what about Jews? Is it possible some of them consider themselves to be "other"?

Whoever "other" is, they are so far doing a bad job of voting.
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"Other" in those results is everyone except those who designated themselves as "Black" or "White" when registering, including all other designated races, "undesignated", and "other".
 
finesse said:
When did the Lumbee get official status? I missed it. It was hung up forever.
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On the NC voter registration form, the demographic data is provided by the voter (and is not mandatory). There's nothing that would prevent Lumbees from self-designating as American Indian.
 
SnoopRob said:
On the NC voter registration form, the demographic data is provided by the voter (and is not mandatory). There's nothing that would prevent Lumbees from self-designating as American Indian.
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I looked it up and they do have state status anyway. They still don't have full Federal recognition.

As you pointed out, it was irrelevant. I was just taken by surprise.
 
superrific said:
I'm violating my own rule about "don't look for meaning in the early vote" but this isn't quite about that. Rather, there are some questions prompted by looking at that count. First, here's the link to NC early voting data.


1. I was intrigued by GOP claims that men are voting more than they did in 2020, given that I had seen that women were voting more than they did in 2020. And it turns out both are right! So far, women have been 51.92% of the early vote (up from 50.4% of total vote in 2020), and men 41.82% (up from 41.4%, so the XX/XY gender gap is even bigger now than total vote in 2020). So how is this possible? Almost 9% of registered voters are "undesignated" by sex. And they turned out about halfway between XX and XY turnout in 2020. But this year, so far, undesignated turnout is sharply down. That's how both men and women can be gaining.

SO -- what does "undesignated" mean? Trans? Didn't check the box on the form (which I thought was required in many places, maybe not NC)? It seems too big to be trans . . .
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The NC form doesn't require demographic data to be completed for the registration to be accepted, so I'm guessing "undesignated" are largely folks who left the entire demographic section blank plus a small number who intentionally didn't choose gender for personal reasons.
 
finesse said:
I looked it up and they do have state status anyway. They still don't have full Federal recognition.

As you pointed out, it was irrelevant. I was just taken by surprise.
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The appointed Director of Indian Affairs for NC was a guy named Richardson-for about 30 years anyway He identifies as a Lumbee as far as I know
 
I just clicked on this thread to scold superrific for veering into this territory, but his first sentence is a mea culpa so it sort of takes the fun out of it!

🤷‍♂️
 
farce© said:
I just clicked on this thread to scold superrific for veering into this territory, but his first sentence is a mea culpa so it sort of takes the fun out of it!

🤷‍♂️
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Unlike some posters here, consistency is a strong suit of mine. I'm not always 100% consistent because nobody is, but I'm pretty good at it I think.
 
SnoopRob said:
"Other" in those results is everyone except those who designated themselves as "Black" or "White" when registering, including all other designated races, "undesignated", and "other".
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That's only on the 2024 report on early voting. The full 2020 report breaks down by the categories I mentioned, but it still includes an "other." And maybe you're right that it's just people that didn't fill out the registration information . . . BUT this category of "other" has its own voting behavior. It can't just be some slice of everyone.

So let me synthesize comments from various people. "Other" is a catch all category probably consisting mostly of people who didn't fill out the demographic data. Who would not do that? People who don't care all that much about registering or voting -- which would indeed explain why turnout among other is low. And who registers without having any real intent to vote? Maybe people who register at the grocery store on on the quad where someone has set up a voter registration booth or table.

So what this tells me is that maybe these registration drives aren't actually all that important. Maybe they end up registering low propensity voters who don't turn out all that much. There are more than a couple of speculative inferences along this derivation but it makes some sense.
 
superrific said:
That's only on the 2024 report on early voting. The full 2020 report breaks down by the categories I mentioned, but it still includes an "other." And maybe you're right that it's just people that didn't fill out the registration information . . . BUT this category of "other" has its own voting behavior. It can't just be some slice of everyone.

So let me synthesize comments from various people. "Other" is a catch all category probably consisting mostly of people who didn't fill out the demographic data. Who would not do that? People who don't care all that much about registering or voting -- which would indeed explain why turnout among other is low. And who registers without having any real intent to vote? Maybe people who register at the grocery store on on the quad where someone has set up a voter registration booth or table.

So what this tells me is that maybe these registration drives aren't actually all that important. Maybe they end up registering low propensity voters who don't turn out all that much. There are more than a couple of speculative inferences along this derivation but it makes some sense.
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Ok, wait.

On the 2024 report you linked, "Other" is everyone except White or Black.

When registering, you can select the following options: AA/Black, Amer Indian/Nat Alaskan, Asian, White, Multiracial, Nat Hawaiian/Pac Islander, or Other. Anyone who doesn't tick a box will be recorded as "undesignated". So "Other" on the expanded list is only those who actively chose "Other" and not those who didn't respond to the question.

I would imagine that some folks don't fill out the demographic data because they simply don't feel it is necessary. But a lot probably skip it because it's not required, so why bother.

I think you're correct that registering low-propensity voters is not a golden ticket to increasing the number of votes received by either particular party. But as part of a process where you assist folks to get registered and then they are followed up by GOTV workers/actions, it's probably one of the best ways to increase the breadth of the party's base (depending on where you go to find those you're registering) and increase party votes at the margins.

I worked back in the day as a paid "volunteer" voter registrar (in 2004 for the infamous ACORN!) and a lot of the folks we registered seemed like they did it only because we or others were asking/pushing them to do so. But there were some who seemed genuinely happy that they could either register for the first time or update their registration at their convenience rather than having to figure out how to do so at greater personal work. I'm guessing a lot of the folks I registered probably didn't become reliable voters, but I hope that some did.
 
This is only tangentially on topic, but since this thread is at least partly about the NC vote count: I voted in Wilson, we had paper ballots that you had to fill in the bubbles with a pen. How was it elsewhere in NC? Obviously filling in a paper ballot like that, there was no way to vote straight Dem, you had to fill out every one that you wanted to vote for. Could anyone else in NC vote straight Dem? That would've saved me some time...
 
hedge said:
This is only tangentially on topic, but since this thread is at least partly about the NC vote count: I voted in Wilson, we had paper ballots that you had to fill in the bubbles with a pen. How was it elsewhere in NC? Obviously filling in a paper ballot like that, there was no way to vote straight Dem, you had to fill out every one that you wanted to vote for. Could anyone else in NC vote straight Dem? That would've saved me some time...
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Mecklenburg is touchscreen, but you can’t vote a straight party ticket. You have to go through and choose one at a time.
 
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