Turnout in WI Was Surprisingly High

Here is some brief perspective on turnout in the Wisconsin election —

Of the voting-age population, 34% cast a ballot in this year’s primary. This is higher than the 31% average for all presidential primaries in WI from 1984 to 2016.

The most comparable recent primary is perhaps the 2012 Wisconsin primary. With President Obama up for re-election in 2012, the Democratic primary was uncompetitive, as was the Republican one this year.  Turnout this year was up 43% from the 2012 primary. In 2016, Wisconsin had extremely competitive presidential primaries in both parties, unlike this year. Turnout this year is down 26% from 2016

What’s most interesting is that turnout in the WI Democratic presidential primary was down only 7.6% from 2016.  That’s extraordinary, because the Democratic primary this year was much less hotly contested than in 2016.  In the Sanders/Clinton contest, Sanders prevailed with 57% of the vote to Clinton’s 43%.  This year, Biden nearly doubled Sanders’ vote total, winning 63% of the vote to Sanders’ 32%.  Turnout would normally fall some with a less competitive election.  The fact that it was down only 7.6% this year, given the circumstances, is thus remarkable.

The decline in turnout from 2016 is nearly all accounted for by the drop in turnout on the Republican side, as it turns out.  That decline isn’t all that surprising, because the 2016 Republican primary was extremely competitive (Cruz 48%; Trump 35%; Kasich 14%), while the incumbent President was essentially unopposed this year.  Turnout would normally drop a lot in those circumstances and it was down 43% this year on the Republican side (for comparison, Democratic turnout in the 2012 primaries, with Obama as an incumbent, fell more than 70% from the Obama/Clinton 2008 contest).

None of this is to take away from any of the real problems that still occurred, with absentee ballots, or with voters facing health risks at the polls. But as an overall picture on turnout levels, these results will be surprising to many.

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