InsiderAdvantage readers know we have been citing the accurate website georgiavotes.com to track early voting which can identify Republican and Democrat voters based on their partisan primary voting patterns and the counties they reside in. As of yesterday the black percentage of the early voting electorate is at 30 percent but the white percentage is down to 58,4, compared with 60 or so last week.
Various analysts say Republican gubernatorial nominee Brian Kemp probably needs the white voter percentage (when all votes are counted) to be 60. He may not obtain a 50 percent-plus Nov. 6th vote if the white percentage drops to 57 (even though that is above the percentage of all registered voters in Georgia who are white, currently 54 percent).
As InsiderAdvantage has already reported, the rural early voting has been strong— in some counties that voted heavily in 2016 for Donald Trump, more than a third of active registered voters have already cast ballots. This favors Kemp. And Republicans traditionally win statewide elections with a heavy rural vote.
On the other hand, early voting so far in traditionally GOP Cobb and Gwinnett counties has been disproportionately African-American. Pundits expect Democrat gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams to win Gwinnett anyway. The county voted majority Democrat in the May primary. And she could win Cobb or at least lose it by low single-digit margin. There is also a pickup in Democratic turnout in Richmond County (Augusta) after a slow start.
Various recent polls, with their heavy and flawed reliance on cell phone respondents, so far don’t indicate Abrams can win an outright majority. She desperately needs to obtain a 33 percent black turnout to have a shot at victory.
So the early vote trend so far leaves two options: 1) Kemp wins a slim majority on Nov. 6th if 2-3 percent of independents/new voters break his way and the Libertarian candidate stays at 2 percent or under. Or, 2) there will be a December gubernatorial runoff election.
