NH Turnout Shatters Records

Warm weather, tight races draw new voters by the thousands
By Zach Samalin,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 8, 2008 7:33 PM CST
NH Turnout Shatters Records
Townspeople cast their ballot while voting in the New Hampshire Primary in Brookline, N.H., Tuesday Jan. 8, 2008.(AP Photo/Charles Krupa)   (Associated Press)

Unseasonably fair weather and a crowded, competitive field of both Republicans and Democrats drew a record number of voters to the polls in New Hampshire yesterday, the AP reports. With 88% of ballots counted, some 453,000 people had voted, besting the previous record of 396,385 votes cast in 2000. This year's total was projected to top half a million.

Heavy Democratic turnout reversed the ratio of the 2000 primary, with 276,000 Dem compared to 229,000 GOP voters, the Concord Monitor reports. Crowded fields were also a draw: "There’s really no one in the state who can say they have no one to vote for," New Hampshire's secretary of state told the Union Leader. (More New Hampshire primary stories.)

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