With
the presidential election just nine days away, the competition for
votes in Florida and other battleground states has become ferocious.
Knowing
that the November 2000 outcomes of two states, Florida and New Mexico,
were decided by 903 votes combined, anxious political operatives have
discovered a range of new demographic niches to chase -- from young
"security moms" to Gen Y punk-rock aficionados.
Among these is the nation's growing Hispanic population,
which has become a coveted demographic prize for both parties.
Hispanics now comprise the nation's largest and biggest-gaining
minority group.
In
record numbers, they are pouring into Florida from elsewhere in the
United States and all parts of Latin America, and into Western
battleground states -- such as Arizona, Nevada and Colorado -- from
California and Mexico.
It is no
surprise, then, that the candidates and their surrogates, like
presidential nephew George P. Bush and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson,
are spending much of these final campaign days in battleground-state Hispanic communities.
Yet
this zeal to capture the political loyalties of the nation's younger
and multiethnic future may prove to be misplaced. When the final
results of next week's contest are tallied, I think that the next
president will be elected by the demographic staple of America's past
-- older whites.
Older whites, including
the "greatest generation" and older baby boomers, may no longer be the
darlings of TV's Nielsen ratings or the intended audience for most
R-rated Hollywood blockbusters.
However,
they have two important attributes for next week's face-off: They are
more likely to vote than the new, more-celebrated demographic groups,
and, for this election especially, they are residing in the right
states at the right time.
It is well-known that voting is more prevalent among the older
population, but the contrast between whites and other major racial
groups is even sharper.
One reason for this is a "translation problem." For Hispanics
in particular, their growing population does not translate directly
into voters. Because they are younger than the general population, one
third of Hispanics are below voting age, and more than a quarter are not citizens.
For every 100 Hispanics
in the population, only 40 are eligible to vote, 23 are likely to
register, and just 18 will show up at the ballot box. The
voter-to-population translation is almost as low for Asians, where only
21 out of 100 people will likely vote. For blacks the number is 37, and
for whites, almost half.
As a consequence, the racial profile of the voting population looks far less like a rainbow than the total population's.
Minorities
now comprise about one third of the total U.S. population, but among
people casting votes next week, it is expected that four out of five
will be white. And 60 percent of these white voters will be older than
45.
Older whites also are better
positioned geographically than minorities to have an impact on the
outcome next week. Most of the nation's Hispanic population
resides in large safely "blue" states such as California, New York, New
Jersey and Illinois, or in the safe "red" state of Texas.
Although there is significant spill-out to battlegrounds, more than
three-quarters of the nation's Hispanics live outside of the 18
battleground states.
More
than 80 percent of Asian-Americans do not reside there. And for blacks,
their recent migration out of the North to mostly "red" Southern states
has had the effect of diminishing their impact on battleground states
they have left, such as Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
On
Election Day, only one out of four black voters will reside in the
battlegrounds. In contrast, 39 percent of all whites will cast votes in
battleground states.
The clout of older
whites can be best understood by drawing a contrast between the
battleground states themselves. In light of its "interesting" election
history and its 27 electoral votes, Florida has deservedly received the
most attention of all the battlegrounds.
Yet
it is clearly a demographic outsider among the largest ones. Like much
of the nation's prosperous Sun Belt, it is growing rapidly from both
immigration and domestic in-movement of whites, blacks, and Hispanics,
which gives it a demographic dynamism and melting-pot feel.
The new influx of white suburbanites, Puerto Ricans and blacks, in
addition to Latin American immigrants, has not only changed the racial
complexion of the state but also its political makeup at a pace that
has kept pollsters scrambling.
Though
white seniors are still important, the new more youthful multicultural
and white suburban-growth surge focuses interest away from senior
issues toward concerns of education, affordable housing, and
small-business opportunities.
This hardly is the case in the other big battleground states, located in the nation's Rust Belt.
States
such as Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan are out-migration states and
hardly magnets for new immigrants. They are composed of left-behind
populations as young families, upscale "empty nesters" and Gen X
professionals head for the Sun Belt or "cooler," more-cosmopolitan blue
America states.
The left-behind
populations are made up disproportionately of white seniors and aging
boomers, including current and ex-blue-collar workers who have borne
the brunt of heavy industry's demise.
More
than one third of Ohio's voting-age population consists of whites age
45 or older who lack a college education. Many belonged to unions and
lived through the Great Society as well as the Reagan Revolution.
To
them, economic survival is important. Their concerns about jobs, health
care, and Social Security benefits are stronger than in other parts of
the country -- where the Iraqi war or wedge issues of the cultural
right such as gay-marriage bans or of the liberal left such as
corporate scandals -- hold more sway.
Moreover,
their voting populations on Election Day will hardly be racially
diverse: 87 percent white in Ohio, 89 percent in Pennsylvania and 84
percent in Michigan, in contrast with Florida, where more than one out
of four voters will be nonwhite.
Of the 18
battleground states, 11 -- mostly in the Midwest and North -- possess
demographics closer to Ohio's than to Florida's. These slow-growing
states comprise 115 electoral votes, compared with 74 in the latter
group. They have more whites and older population than the rest of
America and, in fact, lost five electoral votes after the 2000 census
reapportionment.
Yet because of the sharp
polarization of much of the country into red and blue states, this
throw-back population will have an outsized influence on electing the
next president. It is not a coincidence that Bush's and Kerry's
programs benefiting senior citizens have gotten more play in their
nationally televised debates and commercials than has the price tag
these programs will leave for the next generation.
The
remaining seven battlegrounds, including Nevada, Arizona and Colorado,
have more in common with Florida than Ohio. With their fast growth and
increasing immigration, their demographics reflect America's future,
and one not necessarily tied to a single party's identity.
They
too may have an impact on the expected razor-thin margin of this
election. But their clout will be greater in 2008 and especially in
2012 as more U.S.-born Hispanics and Asians reach voting age and after
the 2010 census awards these states additional electoral votes.
Still,
by measure of sheer demographic force, it appears that older white
voters in slow-growing states are now firmly in the driver's seat. In
terms of electing a president, this may well be their last hurrah.
CONTACT:
William H. Frey is a demographer at the Brookings Institution in
Washington and a research professor at the University of Michigan
Population Studies Center. His Web site is frey-demographer.org
GRAPHIC:
PHOTO: Workers help people register to vote in New York City recently.
For many reasons, the outcome of the race between President Bush and
Sen. John Kerry still has a lot to do with the preference of older
white voters.
SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES
CHART: OLDER WHITES STILL A FORCE ON ELECTION DAY
Despite growing numbers among more diverse groups, whites still dominate the voting population in the U.S.
TOTAL POPULATION
White = 68%
Hispanic = 13.8%
Black = 12.1%
Asian = 4.2%
Other = 1.9%
POPULATION BY VOTING AGE
White = 70.6%
Hispanic = 12.1%
Black = 11.4%
Asian = 4.3%
Other = 1.6%
ESTIMATED VOTERS
White = 79.3%
Black = 11%
Hispanic = 6.2%
Asian = 2.2%
Other = 1.3%
VOTERS IN BATTLEGROUND STATES
White = 85.9%
Black = 7.3%
Hispanic = 4.5%
Asian = 1.1%
Other = 1.3%
SOURCE: William H. Frey analysis of U.S. Census sources, 2003
ORLANDO SENTINEL
Article originally appeared on (http://brownwatch.com/).
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