What percentage of voters in NC are African American. Does anyone know?

[musicblind]

And given the percentage that is African American and assuming that Obama gets them by at least 90%. What percent of the white vote does he then need to win?

Thank you. I tried to look this up but could only find that NC has a little over 21% black population.

-- David

[AnarchoFreeThinker]

1. AA's make up 21% of the electorate. Dems outnumber Reps. Indies are conservative, though.

African-American voters have gone from 20.1% to 20.7% of the N.C. electorate in 2008. By party, Democrats have gone from 44.8% to 45.3%, and unaffiliated voters from 20.9% to 21.4% since January. Those gains have been at the expense of Republicans, who went from being 34.3% of N.C. voters in January to 33.3% by the end of June -- a one-point drop.

I imagine the numbers look even slightly better for us now in september. One caveat, though: the Indies in NC are conservative. That's why with a plurality Dems still haven't taken presidential races here--yet. There's a Dem governor, though, and A-A turnout was boffo for Obama in the primary. Good signs for November with polls having O down just 3-4%.

http://southernstudies.org/facingsouth/2008/07/voter-registration-surges-in-georgia.asp

[musicblind]

6. Thank you for that wealth of information

I am SHOCKED that there are more democrats than Republicans in this state.

Even with conservative indies... I don't see why we lose elections. It seems, even nationally, that there are always more democrats than republicans :(

[Awsi Dooger]

8. Party ID doesn't mean much

The truth in every state is the liberal/conservative breakdown. It's completely meaningless if voters are identifying with Democrats but still consider themselves moderate or slightly right leaning. We win if the liberal percentage is higher than normal and the conservative percentage is lower than the national average. Very few exceptions.

When we nominate someone who is routinely labeled a liberal, I have no idea how we expect to win by significant margin. It's a 21% liberal, 32% conservative nation. And that's being kind. I'm shading on the edges in our direction. It's close to 20/33.

The ideal scenario would be to nominate someone who was considered moderate but would govern like a liberal. The Republicans pull off that crap all the time, feigning moderate and described as moderate then turning the wheel smack right in office.

[EffieBlack]

2. Not much . . .

Kerry got 27% of the white vote and 73% of the black vote in North Carolina in 2004. The black voter turnout was 63%. (U.S. Census)

According to the Washington Post, if Obama gets the same share of the white vote as Kerry did, he will need to increase black turnout by 36% - raising it to 85% in November.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/27/AR2008072701850_pf.html

http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/voting/cps2004.html

[musicblind]

5. I think that is very doable.

What do you think?

[EffieBlack]

10. Definitely

[Awsi Dooger]

3. Black voters aren't enough in the southern states

The percentage is very high. In the 2004 North Carolina exit poll, blacks accounted for 26%. However, in the southern states the white vote is avalanche proportion. Instead of 55-45 in favor of the Republican it can reach 70/30 or higher. That swamps the black vote. In the southern states there is very little gender gap. That's what stands out. The female vote virtually mirrors the male percentage.

Plus, for whatever reason, in the southern states the Democratic split of the black vote is never equal to the national percentage. You can't assign Obama 93-7, or whatever, of the African-American vote in the south.

[rucky]

4. Can't find the study, but...

AA's are somewhere around 20% less represented in voter registration than whites. Taking that to even representation would add about 3% to the popular vote.

[EffieBlack]

9. That's not true. A large black turnout will make a big difference

[knixphan]

7. I'm headed that way-

Making the trek to add my two hands to the GOTV effort in NC... In mostly AA neighborhoods...hopefully we can get a nice healthy turnout!