DEMOGRAPHICS
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Who Voted for Obama
Politico breaks down the exit polls to understand the makeup of Obama's historic victory
By Gabriel Winant
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Posted Nov 5, 08 9:00 AM CST
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(Newser)
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How did the first African-American president piece together such a decisive winning coalition? In Politico, David Paul Kuhn picks apart the pieces of the Barack Obama vote:
- Obama won a solid 43% of the white vote, matching Bill Clinton’s 1996 performance in that group and nearly Jimmy Carter’s from 1976. The Democrat actually won young white voters outright.
- Among white women, however, Obama slightly underperformed Al Gore’s numbers—perhaps an indication of a Sarah Palin effect.
- The bottom fell out for John McCain in suburban America. Though George W. Bush won rural voters by 19 points, McCain only managed to win them by 8.
- Some 67% of Hispanics went to Obama, and 30% for McCain—10 points less than Bush's draw in 2004.
- Despite prognostication to the contrary, Obama won more than 84% of Hillary Clinton backers in the primaries.