The Board of Elections has now released the voter history for those who voted in the recent Storobin-Fidler Special Election.
While it’s a little late, as we have had a Statewide Primary election to digest since then, I thought it would be interesting to compare the Special Election voters to all voters in the (soon to disappear) 27th Senate District.
Party breakdown
All voters
Democrats 58%
Republicans 18%
Special voters
Democrats 64%
Republicans 34%
Well that certainly surprised me.
I would have guessed that a depressed Democratic turnout was one reason for Fidler’s loss. But it turns out that it was those not enrolled in a Party who didn’t vote. In retrospect, this is not surprising to those of us who think that “independent” voters are not the thoughtful moderates that pundits like to write about but are actually uniformed and uninterested.
It is true that registered Republicans were the most motivated but Storobin wouldn’t have won without getting a big chunk of the Democrats.
The Jewish vote
All voters
Likely Jewish 38%
Special voters
Likely Jewish 52%
I’ll give my obligatory disclaimer that ethnic counts are based on surnames and are not 100% accurate and say that the real Jewish percentages are undeniably higher. However the significant thing to consider is if the percentage of the various ethnic groups voting went up or down.
The above Jewish count does not separate Russians, Orthodox & secular Jews.
But what about Russians?
These numbers are even more problematic than the overall Jewish numbers. Storobin’s name would not appear in a Russian dictionary, while my name would appear. But as you see, the Russian percentage of Special Election voters was significantly higher than their percentage of the overall electorate.
All voters
Probable Russians 11%
Special voters
Probable Russians 17%
So we know that Jews and specifically Russians voted in higher numbers, what about other ethnic groups?
All voters
Asians 9%
Hispanics 6%
Italians 7%
Blacks 5%
Special voters
Asians 4%
Hispanics 2%
Italians 5%
Blacks 3%
As in the Bob Turner Special Election win, the low turnout numbers for Hispanics & Blacks are largely responsible for the Republican wins.
Let’s look at some other demographic information to see if there are any other major differences between the overall electorate & the Special voters.
The Female-Male split among all voters is 56-44, in the Special, it was 53-47. Not a major difference but in such a close election, it probably made a difference.
Here’s a major difference I found.
Voters age 65+ are 31% of the District. In the Special, they were 50%!
Conversely, voters under 35 are 21% of the SD but in the Special, they were only 7%.
I’ve only scratched the surface of these numbers and since the 27th Senate District in Brooklyn will cease to exist, I’m not sure how relevant they are but they might affect how future Special Elections in similiar communities are contested.