McCain 2008-Obama 2012 voters

[darklordoftech]

How common were they? What were their demographic tendencies? What tended to motivate their votes?

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

There's some in SE Ohio, from the looks of it.

[Calthrina950]

There's some in SE Ohio, from the looks of it.

This would also describe Hispanic-specifically Cuban-voters in SE Florida and suburban, middle-class voters in New York City (particularly Staten Island) and in New Jersey. Obama flipped Staten Island, which he had lost in 2008, and significantly improved in Miami-Dade County compared to 2008, which is why he was able to win Florida despite swings against him in the remainder of the state.

[Mr. Smith]

Fuzzy Bear

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

I actually did meet a McCain-Obama-Trump voter. Basically standard Republican middle class, middle aged white guy who thought Romney was an elitist prick.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

How common were they? What were their demographic tendencies? What tended to motivate their votes?

Some Hispanic voters. Specifically, Miami-Dade swung Obama's way in 2012, with Romney getting about 30k votes less than McCain, and Obama improving his margin by about 40k - so it seems like a lot of McCain voters went for Obama. This lines up with the fact that Hispanic voters as a whole swung blue in 2012 unlike almost all groups. Based on this, my guess would be Cuban-Americans who had backed Bush twice and distrusted Obama because of socialism accusations, but approved of some of his policies like the ACA and didn't like Romney

[If my soul was made of stone]

Two notable McCain-Obama contingents were Alaskans (the state with the biggest Dem swing between the two elections) no longer distracted by having one of their own on the ticket and residents of New York and New Jersey who were impressed by the federal response to Hurricane Sandy (and perhaps Chris Christie's praise of him). There's an interesting trend of very racially-polarized Southern counties flipping from McCain to Obama (Somerset, MD; Warren, MS; Nash, NC), but I don't know the reasons for this.

[TransfemmeGoreVidal]

I don’t know how representative he was but an old friend of mine who was a devout Catholic from New Jersey that was staunchly pro-life, centrist on economic issues and kind of a neocon on foreign policy but more liberal on immigration and avowedly anti-racist. He was a pretty partisan Republican in the Bush era but in 2012 came around to voting for Obama just because he felt the GOP had lost its mind and sort of left him. Last time I saw him was around 2018 and though he still hadn’t changed any of his views was now a partisan Dem and hardcore anti-Trumper.

[TransfemmeGoreVidal]

There's some in SE Ohio, from the looks of it.

This would also describe Hispanic-specifically Cuban-voters in SE Florida and suburban, middle-class voters in New York City (particularly Staten Island) and in New Jersey. Obama flipped Staten Island, which he had lost in 2008, and significantly improved in Miami-Dade County compared to 2008, which is why he was able to win Florida despite swings against him in the remainder of the state.

I think that catching Bin Laden may have bought him some good Will with conservative law and order types in the New York area and perhaps was a factor in flipping Staten Island.

[Sir Mohamed]

There's some in SE Ohio, from the looks of it.

This would also describe Hispanic-specifically Cuban-voters in SE Florida and suburban, middle-class voters in New York City (particularly Staten Island) and in New Jersey. Obama flipped Staten Island, which he had lost in 2008, and significantly improved in Miami-Dade County compared to 2008, which is why he was able to win Florida despite swings against him in the remainder of the state.

I think that catching Bin Laden may have bought him some good Will with conservative law and order types in the New York area and perhaps was a factor in flipping Staten Island.

Yup, NY was one of just a handful of states Obama improved from 2008 to 2012.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

Two notable McCain-Obama contingents were Alaskans (the state with the biggest Dem swing between the two elections) no longer distracted by having one of their own on the ticket

Alaskans didn't necessarily go from McCain to Obama in any large number. Obama's raw vote total in 2012 was roughly the same as in 2008, but Romney's total was nearly 30k less than McCain's. Alaska swung left, not because Obama picked up a lot of McCain voters, but because Romney didn't.

[Make America Grumpy Again]

There's some in SE Ohio, from the looks of it.

This would also describe Hispanic-specifically Cuban-voters in SE Florida and suburban, middle-class voters in New York City (particularly Staten Island) and in New Jersey. Obama flipped Staten Island, which he had lost in 2008, and significantly improved in Miami-Dade County compared to 2008, which is why he was able to win Florida despite swings against him in the remainder of the state.

I think that catching Bin Laden may have bought him some good Will with conservative law and order types in the New York area and perhaps was a factor in flipping Staten Island.

His response to Hurricane Sandy probably played a role as well