WA Democratic Primary Map

[Meeker]

Quality isn't that great because I haven't quite mastered the whole computer mapmaking thing, but you get the general idea.

There were a very large amount of counties that were just barely below 50%, so the coloring is a little flawed, but here it is:

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Ha! Alcon's county for Hillary!

[Alcon]

Ha! Alcon's county for Hillary!

?

That's not particularly surprising to me at all.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Ha! Alcon's county for Hillary!

?

That's not particularly surprising to me at all.

Why not?

It still would suck though.

[Cubby]

Why did Pierce and Clark go for Hillary, while King and Snohomish went to Obama? They're all large suburban counties.

Thanks for the map Meeker

[Meeker]

Why did Pierce and Clark go for Hillary, while King and Snohomish went to Obama? They're all large suburban counties.

Thanks for the map Meeker

Pierce County can be pretty much divided into three areas: Tacoma, South Sound, and Eastern. Tacoma is the only overwhelmingly Democratic area, and they went heavily for Obama. The Eastern area is very rural and basically prime Clinton country. The suburbs seem to be good Clinton country to me except for perhaps Lakewood which went heavily for Obama. All in all it adds up to a narrow Clinton victory.

Clark I don't know enough about to say for sure, but I'm fairly sure it's a similar dynamic of Vancouver being an urban area that went Obama, a suburban area that split, and then a rural area that went to Clinton.

Snohomish and King are similar, only the urban area in those two make up a large percent of the population.

That's my basic take, Alcon may have another idea

[Alcon]

I essentially agree with meeker, although there are some weirdnesses with the Snohomish County results.  That's not entirely surprising, because Snoho is an unconvential suburban area.  I have only a few minutes to write this post so I'll elaborate later.

Pierce, basically = middle-class suburbs with traditional, older liberals (very slight Obama lean) + liberal urban areas (Obama lean) + working-class urban areas (very slight Clinton lean) + exurban/rural areas with traditionalist leans (strong Clinton lean).  All in all, a Clinton lead isn't remotely surprising.

The LD breakdown, from a quick review of the abstract:

2nd: Strong Clinton
25th: Strong Clinton
26th: Weak Obama
27th: Close, probably an Obama win
28th: Really close, probably an Obama win thanks to a few solid precinct victories [I wonder where?  I'll check this PM]
29th: Looks like a pretty OK Clinton victory
31st: Looks like a  small Clinton victory

Those are:

2nd: Rural and very exurban; Orting, Roy, Eatonville
25th: Suburban/exurban; Milton, Fife, Puyallup, South Hill, Midland
26th: Rural/exurban; Gig Harbor, Key Peninsula
27th: Tacoma - North/Northeast (suburban), East (ghetto suburban)
28th: Suburban - University Place, Fircrest, DuPont, parts of Lakewood
29th: Suburban/urban - South Tacoma, parts of Lakewood, Parkland
31st: Exurban/weirdness - Edgewood, Bonney Lake, Buckley, out to the mountain foothills

More later.

[Alcon]

As for Clark, by the way, there are essentially three Clark Counties, which happen to divide surprisingly neatly along legislative district lines.

The 49th includes urban Vancouver - essentially what parts there were before it experienced a population boom as Portland suburbia.  It extends out to Hazel Dell and Walnut Grove, which have more traditional old suburban areas and a few developments.  I expect Obama won this area, although not overwhelmingly.

The 17th was probably narrowly Clinton.  It's solidly suburban, with a good number of developments.  It's the kind of area that Obama probably had a solid base of support, but Clinton had more.

The 18th is the working-class/development-filled areas of Camas and Washougal, plus exurban and rural areas.  My bet is that, as meekermariner said, this was Clintonland.  There's also a working-class population here, but...well...see Cowlitz County.

All in all, Obama didn't at all perform worse in Clark County than I expected.  He held his own.

I'll probably be able to make a map of Clark (not so much Pierce).

[Meeker]

Clinton won the 29th and Obama didn't do well in the 27th? Huh, not what I expected at all.

Then again, the turnout on this whole thing was way wacky, so you can't really read much of anything into it

[Alcon]

OK, I cracked the voter privacy protection on the Pierce County abstract (basically the electronic equivalent of taping a piece of paper reading "DON'T TAKE THIS PAPER OFF" over something you don't want read).  These are the tentative first count results by LD, town, everything good.

Legislative District
2nd: 55-42 Clinton
25th: 55-43 Clinton
26th: 53-44 Obama
27th: 50-48 Obama
28th: 49-49 Clinton (by 25 votes)
29th: 53-44 Clinton
31st: 53-44 Clinton

Congressional District
6th: 49-48 Obama
8th: 53-44 Clinton
9th: 53-44 Clinton

Municipalities (100+ votes)
Auburn*: 51-46 Obama
Bonney Lake: 53-44 Clinton
Buckley: 54-42 Clinton
DuPont: 55-41 Obama
Eatonville: 50-47 Clinton
Edgewood: 51-45 Clinton
Fife: 50-48 Clinton
Fircrest: 51-48 Obama
Gig Harbor: 49-49 Obama (by 6 votes)
Lakewood: 52-46 Clinton
Milton*: 59-38 Clinton
Orting: 58-40 Clinton
Puyallup: 54-44 Clinton
Ruston: 62-35 Clinton
Steilacoom (kinda): 52-45 Obama
Sumner: 55-42 Clinton
Tacoma: 49-48 Clinton (by 1.27%)
University Place: 50-48 Obama
Unincorporated: 52-45 Clinton

* - Pierce County portion only.

Obama's only focused strong area, interestingly, was rural Gig Harbor, especially around Artondale.

Clinton's best areas were Graham, Summit, and some random rural areas around the Puyallup/White River towns.

Edit: Updated with final numbers

[ottermax]

I actually had a feeling Obama would win Tacoma and SW WA, but not any of the rural Eastern counties (although Yakima makes sense).

[Alcon]

I actually had a feeling Obama would win Tacoma and SW WA, but not any of the rural Eastern counties (although Yakima makes sense).

Yakima has a lot of Hispanics, but he probably did rather well among Yakima whites.

I thought he'd do better in the Benton County.  I may have overestimated anti-Clinton sentiment there.  I didn't expect Benton and Franklin to not be anywhere near each other on that, though.

Early results are looking like Obama's best major locale may have been Bainbridge Island, where he landslided 68%-29%.  Seattle may beat that, though; we'll see.

I don't have many results in yet, but Clinton's best is some nowhere in Lewis County.

[ottermax]

I think San Juan County will show some strong results for Obama. Maybe a few Eastside suburbs. Clinton is like a curse word here.

[Alcon]

I'm looking forward to King County - obviously Clinton did OK somewhere there.  My guess would be that parts of southeastern King County (especially Enumclaw) would have been killer for her.  Bainbridge Democrats are a different sort than Eastside Democrats (much more partisan and liberal), but still, it bodes well for him there and I think you're probably right.  Eastside and Seattle for Obama, southwest mixed, southeast and a few other pockets solid Clinton.

Just my guess.

[Alcon]

Clark I don't know enough about to say for sure, but I'm fairly sure it's a similar dynamic of Vancouver being an urban area that went Obama, a suburban area that split, and then a rural area that went to Clinton.

Apparently we were wrong:

49th (Vancouver urban/suburban): 52-45 Clinton
17th (Vancouver suburban/exurban): 51-46 Clinton
18th (Vancouver exurban/rural): 49-48 Obama

Huh.

(Clark County parts only, obviously the Cowlitz part of the 18th will flip it.)

[Meeker]

Well that's weird.

But again, the turnout on this was all wacky, so strange things can happen.

[War on Want]

I actually had a feeling Obama would win Tacoma and SW WA, but not any of the rural Eastern counties (although Yakima makes sense).

Yakima has a lot of Hispanics, but he probably did rather well among Yakima whites.

I thought he'd do better in the Benton County.  I may have overestimated anti-Clinton sentiment there.  I didn't expect Benton and Franklin to not be anywhere near each other on that, though.

Early results are looking like Obama's best major locale may have been Bainbridge Island, where he landslided 68%-29%.  Seattle may beat that, though; we'll see.

I don't have many results in yet, but Clinton's best is some nowhere in Lewis County.

I have a friend that lived on Bainbridge Island, and he said that it is so Liberal, that if you owned a humvee they would key it, and Bush signs would be burnt down. There is only one church there and he said it is kind of odd. Definatley, Obama territory.

[Alcon]

Other interesting stuff (to me, at least):

- Mike Gravel tied Clinton for first in Washington's smallest town, Krupp (AKA Marlin).

- Sequim, where over half of voters are over 65, and with a median household income of under $28,000, voted Obama by ten points.

- Not a single Republican vote was cast in Nespelem.  The one Republican who votes there in every primary election (literally) must have died or something.

- Hispanics apparently decided to vote in this election.  Democratic ballots outnumbered GOP ones 9-to-1 in Mabton, and 4-to-1 in Wapato.

- The Native American vote varied by tribe.  The Colville favored Clinton, the Makah leaned Obama, and the Yakama were split.  Turnout, as always, sucked.

- Obama barely ran ahead of his Whatcom County average in Bellingham.  He did almost just as strongly in the ultra-Republican Dutch farmland around Lynden.

[Meeker]

- Obama barely ran ahead of his Whatcom County average in Bellingham.  He did almost just as strongly in the ultra-Republican Dutch farmland around Lynden.

I actually know a girl from that ultra-Republican Dutch farmland around Lynden, and her original candidate was Brownback but when he dropped out she switched to Obama. Go figure, I guess it happens.

How many votes were there in Marlin?

[Alcon]

How many votes were there in Marlin?

8

Gravel and Clinton both received 3, Edwards and Obama, 1.

Every town in Pierce County, excluding Carbonado, cast more Democratic ballots than Republican ballots this year.  Other than that, Pierce County ended up kind of boring, but I've updated the numbers on the last page.

Centralia also voted Democratic, which was a bit of a surprise.

Romney won a town in Grant County (Royal City).

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Is that a Mormon area? Any Mormon pockets in Washington?

[Alcon]

Is that a Mormon area?

The nearest LDS church is at Royal Camp, about 10 miles away (where Romney received 35%).  Romney won with only 29 of 62 votes in Royal City.  My guess was that the ultraconservative anti-McCain vote combined with the Mormon vote (which certainly does exist around there).  But it's probably not ultra-Mormon.

Any Mormon pockets in Washington?

There are definitely pockets with high Mormon populations.  It's kind of hard to tell the difference between hard right wing and Mormon votes when it comes to Romney, though.

He also fared poorly among urban areas that tend to have a lot of moderate Mormons (e.g., University Place).

[Alcon]

Sorry KingCo is taking so long - they uploaded the 2007 General canvass instead of this one and now their entire phone system seems to be down.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

How did the Reservations vote?

[Alcon]

How did the Reservations vote?

I actually just covered that.  Makah (Neah Bay, Clallam County) were solidly Obama.  The Yakama had a slight Clinton lean.  Colville (Nespelem, Okanogan County) had a Clinton tilt.  The Muckleshoot Reservation was heavily Clinton, with fewer than twenty votes.  Indian turnout this year sucked more than normal.

I have the KingCo results in, but they're incomplete and seemed to have saved wrong for some reason - the precincts are shifted incorrectly by two.  I'll figure it out when I'm done with other work.

Essentially, Obama rocked the East Side, and lost the inner middle class suburbs.  Seattle was just a hair under 60% Obama.  Obama's best King County town was Sammamish.

As for Seattle itself, Obama won every neighborhood and sub-neighborhood except the Asian-heavy International District, which Clinton won by 1 of 369 votes.  South Delridge, a downscale, mostly Asian/Hispanic neighborhood, was a tie.

Unsurprisingly, Obama's best neighborhood was the Central District (about 40% black), where he received 69%.  The blackest neighborhood in the CD, Mann, the only majority black one, gave him just under 3:1.  Oddly, middle class-and-above Seattle Asians seem to have voted Obama.  Obama also won Seattle's only plurality Hispanic neighborhood, South Park, by a handful of votes.

Neighborhood results:

Ballard: 59-37 Obama
Beacon Hill: 55-43 Obama
Capitol Hill: 63-35 Obama (despite the close caucus results, Madison Park was solid Obama)
Cascade/Lake Union: 63-34 Obama
Central Area: 69-29 Obama
Delridge: 52-44 Obama
Downtown: 57-41 Obama
Duwamish: 55-42 Obama
East Points: 61-36 Obama
Interbay: 57-42 Obama
Lake City: 58-40 Obama
Magnolia: 60-37 Obama
Northgate: 55-42 Obama
Northwest: 54-42 Obama
Queen Anne: 62-36 Obama
Rainier Valley: 67-31 Obama
Seward Park: 63-36 Obama
University District: 67-29 Obama
West Seattle: 54-44 Obama
Woodland: 64-33 Obama (this is Fremont/Greenlake/Phinney/Wallingford)

(Obama kicked some San Franciscan ass.)