Independents to be 50% of NH Democratic Primary Voters

NEW HAMPSHIRE VOTER FILE ANALYSIS

50/50 IN

2020 TRENDS POINT TO HALF OF DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY VOTERS BEING INDEPENDENTS

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I. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary is a crucial test of a candidate’s viability and a crucible of media attention. While the spotlight usually shines on the two major political parties, an increasingly leading role is played by Independent voters. Now the largest share of the electorate in New Hampshire, Independents can cast their ballot in the primary of either major party, and are poised to constitute a historic 50% of the 2020 Democratic primary electorate.

How could the Democratic primary be made up of equal parts registered partisans and Independents? A convergence of four key trends and factors lead to this tipping point.

1. Independents have grown as a share of the electorate for decades New Hampshire’s open primary system has long contributed to a culture of political independence, which finds concrete expression in ever-growing numbers of voters declining to register as Democrats or Republicans. From 1992 to today, Independent voters have increased from 22% to 42% of the state electorate, and this trend shows no signs of slowing; nearly 3 in 5 of voters who registered since the 2018 midterm election are Independent, according to our analysis undertaken using data from the New Hampshire Secretary of State voter file.

2. Independents are voting more in primaries than in past decades This increasingly large population of Independents is also becoming more active in presidential primary elections, rapidly closing the turnout gap with partisans. While just 39% of Independent voters cast a primary ballot in the 2000 election (which saw both parties field a competitive slate of candidates), an average of 56% voted in similar elections in 2008 and 2016. Independent turnout of 57% in 2016 equaled that of registered Democrats (57%) and closed the gap with registered Republicans (61%).

3. Independent turnout surges in primaries opposite an incumbent president Independent participation increases dramatically in primaries elections for the party running against a president seeking reelection, and they tend to flock to the most contested race in any given election cycle. The last time an incumbent Republican ran for reelection, in 2004, Independent turnout in the Democratic primary was 225% of the previous election. Similarly, with a Democratic president seeking re-election in 2012, Independent turnout in the Republican primary surged to 131% of the total four years earlier.

4. Overall turnout is expected to be high, and high turnout is correlated with higher Independent vote share In 2020, this anticipated crest of Independent participation will be further amplified by the Trump era’s historic levels of voter turnout across the board. Further, our analysis shows a significant positive correlation between total voter turnout and the Independent percentage share of that turnout.

Taken together, these trends point towards Independents surpassing their share of 43% of the 2008 Democratic primary electorate, with multiple potential scenarios of reaching 50%.

This analysis was completed with public information from the New Hampshire Secretary of State’s website on voter registration and election history, as well as a voter file appended with commercial data.

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II. INDEPENDENT REGISTRATION AND PRIMARY PARTICIPATION TRENDS For nearly thirty years, the number of Independent voters in New Hampshire has steadily climbed while both Democratic and Republican registration have stagnated. In a similar timeframe, these greater number of Independent voters have become more active.

Registered Independents now constitute more than 42% of the total electorate in New Hampshire.

Number of Registered Votes

NEW HAMPSHIRE VOTER AFFILIATION

As of October 30th, 2019

500,000 400,000

413,345 = 42.22%

275,973 = 28.18%

300,000

289,814 = 29.60%

200,000 INDEPENDENT 100,000

DEMOCRATIC

REPUBLICAN

0 Affiliation Data source: New Hampshire Secretary of State, https://sos.nh.gov/NamesHistory.aspx

The present state of the electorate is the result of long-term trends in registration; while the Democratic and Republican parties of today can claim only modest growth as compared to 1992 (increasing 29% and 18%, respectively), the Independent share of the electorate has experienced an explosive increase of nearly 125%.

VOTER REGISTRATION IN NEW HAMPSHIRE 500,000

1992 to present INDEPENDENT

400,000

REPUBLICAN

300,000

DEMOCRATIC

200,000 100,000 0

1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Data source: New Hampshire Secretary of State, https://sos.nh.gov/NamesHistory.aspx

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In three of the previous five elections, there has been no incumbent president seeking reelection and both parties have had competitive primaries. In 2000, just 39% of New Hampshire Independent voters cast a primary ballot, while an average of 56% voted in similar elections in 2008 and 2016. Independent turnout equaled turnout among registered Democrats in 2016 (57%). and was close to the turnout among registered Republicans (61%). Especially salient for 2020 is the fact that Independent voter turnout surges even further in primary elections opposite an incumbent president. In the two elections this century featuring an incumbent president, Independent turnout in the 2004 Democratic primary was 225% of 2000 turnout, and 2012 Republican primary turnout was 131% of 2008 turnout.

SHARE OF INDEPENDENTS VOTING IN PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARIES 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 2000

2004

2008

2012

2016

39%

38%

55%

37%

57%

DEMOCRATIC

2020 (projected) 50%

REPUBLICAN

Data source: New Hampshire Secretary of State, https://sos.nh.gov/NamesHistory.aspx

Independents are displaying a sharper increase in vote intention than registered Democrats, in part because there is more room to grow. CNN’s 2020 New Hampshire Primary Poll report, published by the University of New Hampshire on October 29th, 2019, provides a comparison to the same poll from the same time in the 2016 election.

Independents stating they will “definitely” vote in the primary increased by 25% (to 60%, up from 48%), while Democrats “definitely” voting grows by just 9% (83%, up from 74%).

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Independents have more room to grow in two ways: there are more of them, and they were voting in the Democratic primary at lower rates than partisan Democrats. As seen in the chart below, the registered Independent share of turnout in Democratic presidential primary elections increases as raw turnout increases.

INDEPENDENT SHARE OF DEMOCRATIC TURNOUT INDEPENDENT SHARE OF TURNOUT (%)

New Hampshire Democratic Presidential Primaries 60

2020

2016

40

2008

2004

2000

projected

20

2012 0 100,000

150,000

200,000

250,000

300,000

350,000

VOTER TURNOUT

However, even with this dramatically increased presence, there is still room for growth in the share of Independent primary voters. The first pie chart below represents the total number of registered Independents (430,345) in New Hampshire as of October 13, 2019.

INDEPENDENT TURNOUT IN THE DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY

DEMOCRATIC TURNOUT IN THE PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY

2020 PROJECTION

2020 PROJECTION

HIGHEST HISTORIC TURNOUT

HIGHEST HISTORIC TURNOUT

34 (140,537) %

65% (170,382)

POTENTIAL ADDITIONAL VOTERS

35% (96,591)

POTENTIAL ADDITIONAL VOTERS

66% (272,808)

Data source: New Hampshire Secretary of State, https://sos.nh.gov/NamesHistory.aspx

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The dark-yellow segment represents the number of Independent voters in the 2020 Democratic primary if turnout for that election, as a percentage of the current total New Hampshire Independent electorate, merely matches the 34% of the Independent electorate that voted in the 2008 Democratic primary election (140,537), the current historic high.

The largest, cream-colored segment represents the remaining 66% of registered Independent voters (272,808) that would not be voting in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary if Independent turnout only equaled its 2008 level of 34%.

If all of the growth factors articulated earlier in this section--rising levels of Independent registration and participation, the anti-incumbent primary surge, Independent attraction to contested races, and unprecedented levels of political interest across the board--lead to an additional 10% (roughly 41,000 voters) of registered Independents voting in the upcoming primary, this level of growth would cause Independent voters to constitute 50% of the total Democratic primary electorate.

In the second pie graph, the largest, deep-blue segment represents the number of registered Democrat voters in the 2020 Democratic primary if turnout for that election, as a percentage of the current total New Hampshire registered Democratic electorate, is able to equal the 2008 Demorcatic primary election’s historic 65% turnout (179,382).

The population of registered Democrats is both much smaller than the Independent population (275,973 versus 413,345) and much closer to exhausting its potential growth pool of potential additional voters, which is 33% of the total registered Democratic electorate versus 66% for Independents.

GETTING TO 50% INDEPENDENTS IN THE DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY Below is a table showing an array of possible Independent and Democratic turnout combinations, highlighting (in darker blue) the scenarios in which registered Independents make up 50% of all voters participating in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary.

Registered Independent Turnout in Dem Primary

Registered D turnout in Dem Primary

65%

66%

67%

68%

69%

70%

38%

38%

36%

35%

34%

32%

31%

39%

40%

39%

37%

36%

35%

33%

40%

42%

41%

39%

38%

37%

36%

41%

44%

43%

42%

40%

39%

38%

42%

47%

45%

44%

43%

41%

40%

43%

49%

48%

46%

45%

43%

42%

44%

51%

50%

48%

47%

46%

44%

45%

54%

52%

51%

49%

48%

46%

46%

56%

54%

53%

51%

50%

48%

47%

58%

57%

55%

54%

52%

51%

48%

61%

59%

57%

56%

54%

53%

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III. MAJOR INDEPENDENT SUBGROUPS AND THEIR KEY ATTRIBUTES The potential surge in the Independent turnout to 50% of the 2020 Democratic primary electorate requires at least 41,000 more Independent votes be cast than in the 2008 primary. The most likely sources of these additional votes are three selected subgroups of Independent voters which seem amenable to activation ahead of the New Hampshire primary, as identified through our analysis undertaken using data from the New Hampshire Secretary of State voter file: Independent general election “super-voters” who don’t traditionally vote in primaries, newly registered Independent voters, and cross-party primary voters.

NON-PRIMARY GENERAL ELECTION SUPER-VOTERS Large subsets of New Hampshire’s Independents are reliable general election voters who do not vote in primaries.

More than 5% of the entire electorate, 52,388 voters, have voted in 3 or 4 of the past four general elections (including “off-year” elections between presidential elections) but zero of the last four primary elections. These general election “super-voters” are the largest pool of likely new Democratic primary voters. This population skews slightly more male than the New Hampshire electorate as a whole, and about half of these voters are 55 and older, and nearly 70% are 45 and older.

The excellent general election voting record of this subgroup gives reason to think they can be turned into primary voters as well, and is probably motivated in part by feelings of a civic duty to vote.

CROSS-PARTY PRIMARY VOTERS The second group is a politically flexible population of Independent voters who have, between 2008 and 2016, voted in at least one Democratic and Republican primary election. There are approximately 39,768 such voters in New Hampshire.

This group skews female, even though the New Hampshire Independent electorate as a whole is nearly perfectly gender-balanced. Cross-party primary voters also tend to be more rural than suburban, to a degree beyond the Independent electorate’s baseline tendency to be rural.

NEWLY-REGISTERED INDEPENDENT VOTERS Since November 7th, 2018, there have been 21,870 newly-registered Independents, as compared to only 9,325 new Democrats and 6,782 new Republicans in the same timeframe; nearly 3 in 5 of voters who registered since the 2018 election are Independent.

These tend to skew male and be younger on average than the Independent electorate in general. The mere fact of having recently decided to register to vote--during the period of most intense political participation in modern history--makes it likely that they are open to engagement and participation in the crowded and competitive Democratic primary.

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ABOUT THE WELCOME PARTY In recent years we have seen more partisanship, but weaker party structures. The entire political system seems focused on increasing polarization, and we have seen a corresponding spike in unaffiliated voters with each passing generation. Nearly half of all millenials are not enrolled in a party.

We spend a lot of time talking about unpolarized voters--sometimes called moderates, or independents, or swing voters--but little time talking with them.

The Welcome Party will build a bigger tent by increasing primary turnout, strengthening our public conversation, and delivering a broader mandate for governing.

The tools and energy to start engaging more voters are there, but existing political entities--candidate campaigns, party organizations, issue groups--are focused elsewhere. The Welcome Party will harness unprecedented enthusiasm, deploying the data and technology solutions of recent campaigns to engage more voters in our democracy and in the process strengthen it every step of the way.

By listening to a broader range of voters and making primary elections more representative, we can strengthen our democracy--reducing polarization and creating the stability for a mandate from the American people.

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