The Field Poll's best guess at turnout: 8.9 million

by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

I complained yesterday about the polling being all over the place, Obama up 6, Clinton up 9 seemed to be the spread. That's 15 points, whoa. The crucial question seems to be turnout. And we get Field's answer (PDF) this morning: 8.9 million, a record turnout for a presidential primary. Of course that doesn't say all that much because we have over 15 million registered voters in the state, and Field estimates there are 23 million Californians eligible, but what can you do?

On mail-in voting: "The Field Poll estimates that of the 8.9 million total votes cast, mail ballots will account for 4.1 million, the largest number for any previous California primary election."

But the big question for the presidential race that seems to be in everybody's thoughts is the turnout demographics:

Overall, 70% of California's primary voters are expected to be white non-Hispanics, 17% Latino, 6% Black/African-American, and 7% Asian/other.  Ethnic voters will comprise a large share of precinct voters (36%) than mail ballot voters (25%), while white non-Hispanics will account for a greater share of mail ballot voters (75%) than precinct voters (64%).

There should be the approximate distribution of voters by age groups - 13% in the 18-29 age group; 15% in the 30-39 group, 20% in the 40-49 group; 30% in the 50-64 group, and 22% in the 65 or older group.  Voters age 65 or older will account for a larger share of the mail ballots (28%) than of the precinct votes (16%).

What to make of that, I don't know. A strong youth turnout would favor Obama, and a strong female vote favors Clinton, or so the conventional wisdom goes. But with records of all sorts being set this year, perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea to toss aside the CW.