Sharron Angle Accuses Harry Reid of Voter Intimidation in Las Vegas [FR cited]

Associated Content ^ | Nov 4, 2010 | By William Browning

[Jim Robinson]

Sharron Angle's political team has accused Harry Reid of "stealing" the Nevada senatorial election, according to a blog on Babble.com. Even a popular trend on Google during the day Nov. 3 spoke of how popular Angle's argument was becoming.

On election night, Angle's team filed a complaint with the Justice Department saying casino owners were told to make sure their union members got out to vote on election night, as reported by Yahoo! News. Free Republic even posted pre-election polling data versus actual returns and made the revelation that Reid's son, Rory, is the county election commissioner for Las Vegas...

[Fresh Wind]

* Unusually high turnout of 64.5%, when high turnout is 45% and average in the 30s.

Not true. In 2008, the total of registered voters in Nevada was about 1.45 million, and about 967,000 votes were cast. That's a turnout of about 66%. The turnout in the 2006 midterm election was about 59%.

[Lexinom]

That's based on what Red Steel had posted.

If these people were likely voters, why did they not get representation in ALL of the polls leading up the race? I understand you probably don't have the answer, and neither do I. Well, I have my suspicions...

[Fresh Wind]

I didn’t say there wasn’t fraud, only that turnout isn’t the smoking gun that proves the election was stolen.

You might find this thread interesting:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2622176/posts

[Red Steel]

Not true. In 2008, the total of registered voters in Nevada was about 1.45 million, and about 967,000 votes were cast. That's a turnout of about 66%. The turnout in the 2006 midterm election was about 59%.

Well if that's true, Nevada has exceptionally high turnout rate compared to the rest of the nation.

And yes, 2008 was a very high year for a presidential turnout nationwide, but historically speaking, Nevada numbers this year are way high compared to a good portion of past elections even against presidential years:

Here are presidential turnouts in a 60 year time frame:

1932, 52% ; 1936, 57%; 1940, 59%; 1944, 56%; 1948, 51%; 1952, 62%; 1956, 59%; 1960, 63%; 1964, 62%, 1968, 61%, 1972, 55%; 1976, 54%; 1980, 53%; 1984, 53%; 1988, 50%; 1992; 54%, and 1996; 49%.

Source: The Human Polity: A Comparative Introduction to Political Science; figure 6-1, page 198, which the book sources New York Times, November 5, 1992.

And the last Republican victory surge in the 1994 mid-term elections where they won 53 seats nationwide turnout was only 36%. I suppose the state of Nevada was in the 60 percentile in 1994 too?

[Red Steel]

Note: The 1996 turnout figure above is from another source.

[Red Steel]

From Wiki to fill in the other presidential election years besides 2008:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_turnout#cite_note-Niemi_and_Weisberg_p._31-0

[llandres]

Happy belated birthday, Jim - and many, many more! Hope you had a good one :-)

[Red Steel]

You might find this thread interesting:

You may find this interesting.

The 1st column next to the state is the "VEP Highest Office Turnout Rate"

The 2nd column is the "VEP Total Ballots Counted Turnout Rate," which is the rate "preferred" to publicly report because it is the statistic that includes all of the registered voters in the state.

According to Dr. Michael McDonald, Department of Public and International Affairs of George Mason University, that Nevada's turnout rate for the 2006 midterm election was 37.1%. So Nevada almost doubled their turnout rate compared to their last midterm election if the 64.5% figure is correct.

And the 3rd column is "VAP Turnout Rate"

See below the graphic for explanations of terms.

"VEP Turnout Rate is the vote for highest office divided by the voting-eligible population or VEP. In a midterm election, the vote for highest office is the highest vote tally for Governor, U.S. Senator, or combined House of Representatives. The voting-eligible population is the best estimate of the number of people eligible to vote.

VEP Total Ballots Counted Turnout Rate is the total ballots counted divided by the voting-eligible population. The total ballots cast includes blank and other such ballots, but does not include rejected provisional ballots. This would be the preferred turnout rate statistic, but all states do not report total ballots cast. An adjustment based on the ratio of votes for highest office to the tital ballots cast for the states that report both numbers has been applied to the national highest office to estimate the U.S. total turnout rate.

VAP Rate is the vote for highest office divided by the voting-age population, all residents age 18 and older. Although not recommended, this statistic is provided for organizations such as polling firms that sample the voting-age population."

Source: http://elections.gmu.edu/Turnout_2006G.html

[Fresh Wind]

I think we are dealing with an apples/oranges situation.

If I understand your graphic correctly, the "E" in "VEP" means "eligible", and the number of eligible voters (1.8 million) includes those who are registered, and those who could be registered if they chose to do so.

According to the Nevada State website, there were about 1.2 million registered voters in October, 2006. Note also that they distinguish between total registered voters and active voters.

This link provides an explanation of "active" and "inactive" voters.

So, you have 1.8 million eligible voters, 1.2 million registered voters, and just under 1 million "active" registered voters.

The total turnout percentage figures that appear here for the 2006 elections use the active registered voter number, and show a total turnout of 59%.

If you use the total registered number, you get 49%, and if you use eligible voters, you get 33%.

For whatever reason, the turnout numbers that are being circulated are based on active registered voters, and they will always show higher turnout rates.

I am in no way saying that there was no fraud in the recent election, only that these high turnout numbers are not the smoking gun that would prove it.

[Red Steel]

For whatever reason, the turnout numbers that are being circulated are based on active registered voters, and they will always show higher turnout rates.

Apples and oranges indeed. "Active registered voters" is a misleading figure in IMO, and in my view, the majority of statisticians who track voting also put emphasis on the bottom line by using the total of all state registered voters.

In another example,

'The PEW Center of States' said in 2006 that Nevada's turnout was 36.89%, which is only slightly different than George Mason University's percentage.

www.pewcenteronthestates.org

A quote on top of their Webpage:

"Demand for Democracy. Only 40 percent of those eligible to vote actually go to the polls in off-year elections. How can states reach the other 60 percent?"

[Red Steel]

A little bit more clarification...

According to the Nevada State website, there were about 1.2 million registered voters in October, 2006. Note also that they distinguish between total registered voters and active voters.

Nevada also reported 1,331,197 total registered voters in December of 2009. And On May 25, 2010 KOLO TV (AP) reported "There are 1.3 million registered voters in Nevada as of the end of April."

http://www.kolotv.com/home/headlines/94863874.html

So the voter turnout rate for this Nevada election was really 51.28%.

*682,651 / 1,331,197 = 51.28% - is not a lot higher than Gallup's generic 45% US wide high turnout percentage.

*The 682,651 figure is the combined total votes for both Angle and Reid.

The 51.28% doesn't set off my BS meter like the widely reported 64.5% figure does in this mid-term senate race.