According to Shad Balch, spokesman for California Secretary of State Bill
Jones, 3.2 million requests for absentee ballots were made in the state
before the Nov. 7 election, and historically, 85 percent of those
requests
get turned in. This would mean in just the Golden State alone, more than
2.7 million people voted for president by absentee ballot.
Currently, Vice President Al Gore leads Texas Gov. George W. Bush in
California by more than 12 percent. Looking at the state's popular vote,
Gore leads with 5,443,722 votes to Bush's 4,223,342 votes. The difference
between the two candidates is a little over 1.2 million votes.
On the national scale, however, Gore's lead over Bush in the popular vote
dwindles to 222,880 votes out of nearly 100 million votes recorded. Gore
leads Bush in the electoral count 255-246 so far.
Balch said: "The
counties
have told us that as of right now, they have yet to count a total of
1,021,000 absentee votes. You cannot speculate who those will go for."
Although predicting the final outcome of the absentee ballots in the state
is difficult, Mark DiCamillo at the Public Policy Institute of California
ventured a guess that they would reflect the general voting trend
throughout the state.
The Public Policy Institute of California has been measuring the absentee
votes in California for Voter News Service for the past 10 years.
"The late absentees are more likely to be reflective of the total
electorate, not so much the organized campaign-motivated vote, which is
what
I would characterize the early absentees. They're different groups,"
DiCamillo said.
DiCamillo further explained that approximately 60 percent of the absentee
votes had already been included in the total popular vote for California.
In fact, the "first wave" of absentee ballots were counted in advance of
the
election and were the first to be reported on election night after the
polls
closed throughout the state at 8 p.m. PST.
Regarding the conventional wisdom that absentee voters tend to lean
toward
the conservative candidate, DiCamillo said there was no question that at
least the initial absentee ballots did so for Bush. He credits the
California Republican Party's massive drive to get out the vote early by
encouraging the conservative base to vote absentee.
"The early absentees were for Bush. No question about it," said DiCamillo.
"But the late absentees, generally speaking, are more reflective of just
the
growing phenomenon in California of the preference to vote by mail, and
we' re talking about over 2.5 million absentee voters out of close to 11
million
voters."
DiCamillo added that because of the Republican effort to get out the vote
early, there was a more Republican lean in the absentee ballot total. He
concluded, though, that the remaining absentee ballots will lean toward
Gore.
According to Balch, some of the smaller counties in the state could have
their results certified as early as Friday, but the deadline for all
counties in the state is Dec. 5.
With the popular vote of the nation so close, it could still be another
couple of weeks before either candidate or the country knows who got the
most votes.
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