With 99% of precincts reporting, Conway has received 44% of the vote. That's 226,773 votes. His opponent, Lt. Gov. Dan Mongiardo received 221,269 votes. Rand Paul, the runaway winner of the Republican primary, received a total of 209,159 votes. In other words, both Democrats received more votes than either Republican. Which doesn't make it sound like the GOP base is energized for the Rand Paul rEVOLution.US News and World Report:
The shrinking enthusiasm gap. The most striking stat I've seen about Tuesday's primaries: Turnout in the Kentucky Democratic primary was 48 percent higher than in the much more closely watched GOP primary. To put it another way, the second place Democrat got more votes on Tuesday than did Rand Paul. It's true that Democrats have a registration advantage in Kentucky and that their race was more competitive at the end, but given the enthusiasm gap horror stories we've been hearing, the number is pretty arrestingAllVoices.com:
On the Republican side, which got all the national media attention, a total of 351,000-plus votes were cast. This means that Conway (228,531) and the second-place finisher Mongiardo (224,989) both received more votes than Paul (206,812). So looked at another way, even though Paul won the GOP primary, he also finished third in a statewide race.Wrong. Wrong. And Wrong.
This is not the surprise everyone makes it out to be. Kentucky only lets those with registered party affiliation vote in primaries and:
Registered Democrats in Kentucky outnumber Republicans by 573,139 voters.
Turnout, as a percentage of registered party voters, was actually higher in the Republican contest than in the Democratic contest, 33.6 percent as compared to 31.8 percent.Secondly, this always happens in contested Senate primaries in Kentucky. Just for an example, lets look back at the last time this Senate seat was open, 1998. Jim Bunning won the GOP primary with over 74% of the vote, by even more than Paul did, and he only received 152,493 votes. That vote total would have put him 4th in the Democratic primary. Guess who won in the general election? Bunning. Paul was at least in 3rd and within 20,000 votes of the winner of a 2-way Democratic primary. Bunning received the 4th most votes and was over 40,000 votes behind the winner of a Democratic primary where 3 candidates received more than 25% of the vote, despite winning a higher percentage of votes in the Republican primary than Paul.
Third, Kentucky tends to elect more Democrats to statewide office. Democrats hold a majority in the state House. The two Democratic candidates for the nomination were the attorney general and the lieutenant governor. The governor is a Democrat. However, at the federal level Kentucky consistently elects Republicans. Both current Senators and 4 of 6 member of the House are Republicans. McCain won by 16% of the vote here in 2008. Don't be fooled. Kentucky is still a solidly red state in federal elections despite what the primary vote numbers might have you believe. In federal elections it is the norm for Kentucky Republicans to win the votes of many independent and registered Democrats.
Amazing what a bit of research into the specifics of a state's political landscape can turn up. If anything can be read into the results of the primary turnout it is probably something closer to the polls that show Conway nipping at Paul's heels in the general election are showing things too close.
Update: While he may not win by 25% again, I think the general election will be further from a Conway victory and closer to another
and this latest Rasmussen Reports poll seems to agree with me.
