Obama Benefits from Record Turnout of Early Voters

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As CBS reports, early voting has been increasing nationwide for some time, from 7% of all votes cast in 1992 to 20% in 2004. But this year, excitement over the “change” election has broken many state records for early voter turnout. In Colorado, for instance, early voters amount to more than 31% of registered voters. One woman in Georgia reported waiting more than eight hours to vote early.

And how are early voters voting? The AP reports that early voters are overwhelmingly breaking for Obama. Here’s their breakdown by party in several key states:

Florida: About 2.6 million people have already voted in a state where
absentee ballots overwhelmingly favored President Bush in the
razor-thin 2000 election. Among those voting so far this year, 45% are
registered Democrats and 39% Republicans.

North Carolina: About 1.6 million people have already voted — 54%
are registered Democrats and 29% are Republicans. About 100,000 newly
registered voters have signed up and voted at North Carolina’s one-stop
voting centers. Among them, Democrats outnumbered Republicans by about
2-1.

Iowa: About 340,000 people have already voted — 49% are registered Democrats and 29% are Republicans.

Colorado: About 815,000 people have voted — 39% are registered Democrats and 37% are Republicans.

Nevada: About 342,000 people have already voted in Clark and Washoe
Counties, which contain nearly 90% of the state’s population. Among
those voters, 53% are registered Democrats and 30% are Republicans.

New Mexico: About 111,000 people have voted in Bernalillo County,
the state’s largest. Among them, 55% are registered Democrats and 33%
are Republicans.

Georgia: Black voters make up about 35% of those who have already
voted — a big increase from the 2004 election, when 25% of the state’s
electorate was black. Blacks voted for Obama by ratio of 9-1 in
Georgia’s Democratic primary this year.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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