Sabato's Crystal Ball Compares Abortion Referendums to Statewide Election Results

[Gracile]

This is an insightful piece that compares the results of various statewide abortion ballot measures to the results of recent statewide elections - highlighting the ways these measures have diverged from baseline partisanship:

https://centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/the-atlas-of-post-dobbs-abortion-ballot-measures-part-one/

The most interesting trend here is how these measures had their most significant underperformance in minority (and mainly predominantly black) communities. This is evidenced by the results of the Michigan Proposal 3 in Wayne County (and to a lesser extent Genesee and Saginaw), where Whitmer outperformed it:

Whitmer performed better than Proposal 3 in 6 counties, with her best relative performance coming in the state’s most populous county: Detroit’s Wayne County. Countywide, Whitmer did about 7 points better than Proposal 3 (she carried Wayne County by 43 points while it supported Proposal 3 by a little more than 36 points) but she outperformed the amendment by 24 points within Detroit proper. The center image on Map 3 shows a municipal-level breakdown of Wayne County. One common theme was that Whitmer fared better in areas that have high non-white blocs. In Garden City in the center of the county, Proposal 3 did about 8 points better than Whitmer. Garden City is virtually all white by composition. But going just one city to the south, Inkster, which is about three-quarters Black, Proposal 3 ran more than 20 points behind Whitmer. Proposal 3’s weakness also extended into Dearborn, which bumps up against Detroit and has a large Arab-American population. Aside from Wayne, only two other counties in Michigan are more than 20% Black by composition: Genesee (Flint) and Saginaw — Whitmer outperformed Proposal 3 in each.

This piece did not cover Kentucky Amendment 2 (they will get to that in another article next week), but there was a similar pattern where the "No" vote on the amendment underperformed Charles Booker in Louisville's heavily black precincts - which is significant as "No" overperformed Booker statewide by significantly more.

The article also makes reference to some of the trends Atlas users observed in the Ohio Issue 1 thread. Specifically, "Yes" had higher overperformances in parts of Appalachian Ohio that used to be much more Democratic, while having lower rates of overperformance in the longtime Republican Northwestern part of the state. This highlights differences in religiosity and pre-Trump era political cleavages.

[Person Man]

What I want to know is what it means for Ohio in November

[SnowLabrador]

What I want to know is what it means for Ohio in November

Nothing.

[Miles]

Glad you enjoyed it! We kept getting asked about how these referendums did compared to actual candidates, so we figured we'd do a piece on it and get it out there.

[Atlas Force]

Glad you enjoyed it! We kept getting asked about how these referendums did compared to actual candidates, so we figured we'd do a piece on it and get it out there.

Hi Miles!

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Glad you enjoyed it! We kept getting asked about how these referendums did compared to actual candidates, so we figured we'd do a piece on it and get it out there.

Nice to see you Miles! Best of wishes in your work.

[Miles]

Thanks, guys. I kinda migrated to Twitter after spending years on here... but with Twitter being what it's gotten to be now, I may be stopping in more haha But I appreciate it!

[Holmes]

Ooh a rare Miles sighting, very nice.

[Oryxslayer]

Thanks, guys. I kinda migrated to Twitter after spending years on here... but with Twitter being what it's gotten to be now, I may be stopping in more haha But I appreciate it!

We're all in the same boat

[ottermax]

This was a great article! It makes me wonder if some of the rightward shifts we observed in 2022 in the South and other areas with strong minority populations might have been related to lower turnout or disengagement with abortion as an issue relative to white voters.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

The rightward shift was due to IAN

[Gass3268]

What I want to know is what it means for Ohio in November

Nothing.

This November it will probably mean a lot given the abortion and marijuana referendums are the main things on the ballot.

[Gracile]

Redistricter recently uploaded the 2022 Michigan referendum data to their site. You can see some of the aforementioned shifts from the 2020 presidential election in the Detroit metro here:

https://twitter.com/Redistricter/status/1693378197319020591

[Gracile]

And here's part two of the series where they compare ballot measures in VT, CA, MT, and KY:

https://centerforpolitics.org/crystalball/articles/the-atlas-of-post-dobbs-abortion-ballot-measures-part-two/