Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Exit poll watch: This site seems to be posting some tidbits on exit polls from Ohio and Texas. Don't know how reliable the information is, though.

Post will be updated when more information comes in.

UPDATE: From the first wave of Dem. exit polls in OH:

The first wave of Democratic exit polls are in: more women are voting then men, and the highest turnout is among white women, according to exit polls conducted by Edison/Mitofsky. The earliest results were gleaned from 1,020 Ohio voters.

Of those polled so far, 75 percent are white and 20 percent are African-American. Three percent are Hispanic.

Thirteen percent are between the ages of 17 and 29; 27 percent between the ages of 30 and 44; 33 between the ages of 45 and 59 and 26 percent older than 60.

Eighty percent of voters in the Democratic primary made their decision a week ago or more.

Fifty-nine percent considered the economy the most important issue facing the country, followed by 18 percent considering Iraq most important and 19 percent considering health care their most important.

Geraghty's seeing some exit polls that show a close race.

More exit poll data from ABC News. "Change" still trumps "experience" (though not by as much as in previous races):

The theme of change continues to resonate in Ohio and Texas, but not by as wide a margin as in most previous primaries. The ability to "bring needed change" beats "experience" as the most important quality in a candidate by about a 20-point margin in Ohio and by about 15 points in Texas, according to preliminary exit poll results.

That compares, for example, with the Wisconsin primary, where change beat experience by 32 points.

Preliminary exit poll results also suggest a healthy turnout by Latinos in the Texas Democratic primary, where early results indicate they're accounting for just over three in 10 voters. If that holds, it'll be a record.

Blacks account for about two in 10 Texas Democratic voters, closer to their customary share of the electorate. In this early data blacks also account for two in 10 in Ohio, which if it holds would be up from 2004.

Turnout among women looks to be up in both states in these preliminary results -- they account for about six in 10 voters in Ohio, and not quite as many in Texas, compared with 52 percent in Ohio and 53 percent in Texas in 2004.

The economy is the top issue in Texas and Ohio alike, and most strikingly so in Ohio, where nearly six in 10 Democrats rank it as the single most important issue. If that holds in later data, Ohio would be second only to Michigan in the importance of the economy to Democratic primary voters.

People in Ohio and Texas are still voting--so these numbers can certainly change.


7:40 ET: CNN exits for Ohio. Clinton wins Democrats 53-46. Loses Republicans and independents about 46-54.

8:08 ET: Clinton seems to be doing stronger among later deciders. In the CNN Ohio exits, she beat Obama 55-45 among those who decided in the past 3 days (compared to 50-49 among those who decided after. Some exit polls from Texas have her winning 66-34 among late deciders in Texas.