Record Number Of Absentee Voters Key In Two Republican Victories

Nearly a third of all the state’s voters who bothered to cast ballots last month did so by mail.

That record high for absentee balloting - coupled with a historic low for overall turnout - spelled the difference in two close congressional races and revealed a winning strategy for Republicans in Washington state.

It also forced political experts to throw out old theories about absentee voters.

“It used to be absentee voters were Republican, elderly - shut-ins and seniors - and predominantly women,” said Brett Bader of The Madison Group, a political consulting firm that handled the state GOP’s absentee campaign. “Now they are all ages, and they more closely resemble the voting public at large.”

They also don’t vote as soon as the ballot comes in the mail, which can be three weeks before the election.

Bader was among those who remained confident on election night when poll results showed freshmen Reps. Linda Smith and Jack Metcalf trailing their Democratic challengers. In the end, he and other GOP officials were right, and the news media, which took its cue from The Associated Press analysis of the early votes, were wrong.

“We had worked to get our voters to vote by absentee ballot,” said Bader. “Otherwise, they might skip voting.”

The GOP also mailed a series of brochures to absentee voters, right up to election day. It was the same sort of literature it sent to voters who were expected to go to the polls. The party reasoned that most of the absentee ballots remained out and there would be no major differences between voters who went to the polls and those who went to the mailbox.

Democrats say they went after the absentee voters early, but acknowledge they were not as diligent at following up. That cost them votes among the people who held onto their absentee ballots until close to Election Day.

“I think the national campaign lost some steam in the last five days or so,” said Paul Berendt, state Democratic Party chairman. “It seemed that the later people voted, the more conservative they seemed to vote.”

Republicans may also have hit on a smart strategy by urging voters to split their government - acknowledging that Bill Clinton was likely to win the White House and suggesting that a Republican Congress was needed to keep him in check, Berendt said.

Berendt won’t say the Democrats made a mistake by not encouraging more voters in its key areas to sign up for absentee ballots. The party spent its efforts identifying likely Democratic voters and got about 85 percent of those voters to the polls, he said.

He’s not sure that a significant number of the remainder would have voted by absentee ballot.

“But will we be sending out absentee request forms in the future? After this election, we will have to,” he added.

As the number of absentee ballots grows, it will increase the cost of campaigning, Bader said. And delay the amount of time required before the true results are known for close races, he added.

“This rush to proclaim winners, you’ve got to be careful,” he cautioned. “We’re less likely to know the true results on election night.”

, DataTimes