Northern Virginia early votes are starting to catch up to where Democrats would like them to be ahead of the April 21 congressional redistricting referendum.
When I last checked, on April 10, NoVa’s early turnout was at 98.8 votes cast per 1,000 registered voters, per data from the Virginia Public Access Project.
As of the end of the voting day on Tuesday, three early-voting days later, Northern Virginia – estimated population: 2.6 million – is at 148.7 votes cast per 1,000 registered voters.
The biggest raw-vote increase was in Fairfax County, which had more than 42,000 early votes cast between April 10 and April 14, more than a third of its 122,308 early votes cast this cycle.
This is good news for the “Yes” side on the referendum.
The NoVa vote is going to go 65-70 percent, thereabouts, “Yes,” and the raw number of votes in that region are obviously significant.
Hampton Roads – estimated population: 1.8 million – is at 149.3 early voters per 1,000 registered voters, per the VPAP numbers.
We can expect Hampton Roads to be in the 55-60 percent “Yes” range, and again, this is a lot of raw votes.
The Capital region, Richmond and surrounding counties – estimated population: 1.3 million – is at 179.3 early voters per 1,000 registered voters.
Another 55 percent or so region for the “Yes” side, and another area with a huge number of raw votes.
Democrats are going to want to focus their GOTV efforts in those three areas, to get a working margin and begin to run up the score in the final tally.
Analysis: ‘No’
Republicans will focus on areas outside the Crescent.
Early votes in the MAGA-heavy Valley of Virginia region – encompassing the Shenandoah Valley and New River Valley; estimated population: 700,000 – are at 182.4 per 1,000 registered voters.
This region will go 75-80 percent “No.”
I’d be most concerned, if I were on the GOP side here, with the trends in two other 75-80 percent “No” areas:
- Southwest Virginia – estimated population: 300,000 – which has an early-turnout rate at 153.5.
- Southside Virginia – estimated population: 200,000 – which has an early-turnout rate at 167.5
Bottom line
My quick math on this has things right at the 52 percent-48 percent line, assuming the Dems can continue their late trends in turnout in NoVa.
Republicans can do a little better in terms of turnout in Southwest and Southside, but honestly, they’re better off putting their time to confusing “Yes” voters in the Crescent into either voting “No” or just not voting.
Which is, of course, what they’ve been doing, with their misleading – not even borderline lying, actually – TV spots and mailers.
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Chris Graham
