Independent Voters Could Tilt NH Primary
(AP) — True to its feisty Yankee heritage, New Hampshire is loaded with independent voters. That could spell an edge in Tuesday’s presidential primaries there for Barack Obama and John McCain.
It also leaves the two candidates – who both appeal to anti-establishment voters – competing for many of those same independents, even though Obama is a Democrat and McCain a Republican.
About 45 percent of the state’s 828,000 registered voters were unaffiliated with either party as of Oct. 31, the most recent data available, according to the New Hampshire secretary of state’s office. That’s a huge proportion – polls of people entering last week’s Iowa caucuses showed that independents comprised 20 percent at the Democratic gatherings and 13 percent at the GOP’s.
By law in New Hampshire, independents are free to vote in either party’s primary. How they divide between the two will be watched closely as the latest indication of fervor in a race that has generally shown more voter excitement on the Democratic side.
New Hampshire’s secretary of state, Bill Gardner, predicted last week that six in 10 independents will opt to vote in the Democratic contest. Recent polls in the state, including this weekend’s by USA Today and Gallup, had similar findings.
That same USA Today/Gallup Poll showed Obama, a senator from Illinois, and McCain, an Arizona senator, with big advantages among registered independents in New Hampshire.
Obama led his major rival, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, among independents by 46 percent to 25 percent in that survey, helping him to a 13 percentage point lead. McCain had a 40 percent to 25 percent edge over former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney among independents, boosting him to a narrow overall advantage.
It’s not just the sheer numbers of independents that makes them a pivotal group to watch in New Hampshire. Historically, they have often been decisive.
Exit polls of voters showed that independents made up 48 percent of the vote in the 2004 Democratic primary and voted heavily for Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, helping the party’s eventual presidential nominee to a victory there.
In 2000, the last year both parties held primaries in New Hampshire, independents’ votes were telling in the GOP race.
They accounted for four in 10 of the votes cast in that year’s Republican contest, and they went for McCain by about a three-to-one margin over George W. Bush. McCain won that primary, but went on to lose the nomination to Bush.
On the Democratic side, independents favored former New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley. But Vice President Al Gore had overwhelming support among Democrats and won that primary, and the nomination.
Overall in New Hampshire that year, about six in 10 independent voters opted to vote in the GOP primary.
This year, independents have already influenced the start of the Democratic nominating battle, giving Obama a big edge in his victory over Clinton and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards in Iowa last week.
McCain, who did not campaign heavily in Iowa, divided that state’s independent vote fairly evenly with Romney. GOP winner Mike Huckabee was not far behind.
