http://ballot-access.org/2021/02/11/new-pennsylvania-registration-data-2/
Pennsylvania Elections Department has released the first registration totals for any minor parties since February 2020. The new figures are: Democratic 4,075,927; Republican 3,458,241; Libertarian 46,037; Green 10,240; independent and miscellaneous 1,222,818.
The percentages are: Democratic 46.25%; Republican 39.24%; Libertarian .52%; Green .12%; independent and miscellaneous 13.87%.
In February 2020, the percentages were: Democratic 47.45%; Republican 38.19%; Libertarian .47%; Green .12%; independent and miscellaneous 13.77%.
The 2021 registration numbers above are as of February 1st I think.
As a longtime reader of Ballot Access News which has always reported these numbers when they are released, I'm amused by the media's and this message board's sudden interest in politcal party registration as well as how they only report one side of it. We're completely ignoring how over 1 year the Democrats are down more than 1% and the Republicans are up more than 1%.
People on this board I expect to be one-eyed, journalists however should be held to a higher standard. I might be in the mood to call journalists out for being water carriers.
No kidding, they've been water carriers for years. This isn't new. This forum and all the political prognosticators in the media ignored voter registration for the entire 2020 cycle, and it's part of why they got the election so wrong.
There should also be differentiation between party switches and new registrations. A party switch from R to D indicates a high chance of a reliable Dem voter, a party switch from R to I may just indicate temporary frustration with the party (either from an establishmentarian or Trumpian angle) who may still vote R in the future. Accumulation of more (relative to the other party) new registrations over time would point to increasing vote shares in the state. Dems were wrong to dismiss the GOP's growing advantage in PA and other states as just Dems who voted for Trump in '16 and were just now switching, because lots of new registrations were happening too. Republicans were wrong to assume the entire effect of voter registration changes would be felt in the election results, because some of them were Trump-voting (in '16) Dems and Indies changing to R because they had fully accepted Trump and/or fully discredited Dems.
