Election Day in the Cradle of Liberty
Last Word
With 98 percent of the votes now tallied, the expected has become official: It was all John Kerry in Philadelphia.
With the stakes high and the preferred choice considered obvious by most in this city, the people here turned out in droves to cast votes in the presidential election. In the end, Kerry carried the city by more than 390,000 votes, soaring far beyond Mayor John Street’s projections and significantly improving upon Al Gore’s margin of victory from four years ago. Roughly 650,000 Philadelphia residents cast ballots — an exceptionally high total relative to 2000 and other recent elections — helping land Pennsylvania in the Democratic column by more than 140,000 votes.
Kerry also put up a strong showing in the Philadelphia suburbs — which were considered crucial swing areas in the race for the state’s electoral votes. In Delaware and Montgomery counties in particular, he convincingly outpolled Bush, carrying each by more than 40,000 votes.
However, with a Bush victory now projected in Ohio (and, thus, in the Electoral College), it appears that Pennsylvania, despite its battleground status throughout this heated campaign, will not have a decisive impact on the 2004 presidential election.
11:55 p.m.
If the goal was to end George W. Bush’s tenure in the White House, the jury’s still out. But if the goal was to secure Pennsylvania’s 21 electoral votes and give John Kerry a shot at the presidency in Ohio and the Upper Midwest, the people of Philadelphia delivered the goods.
The exact numbers are not yet etched in stone at this hour, but Kerry is the projected winner here in the Keystone State. To be sure, high turnout in Philadelphia sealed the deal, with get-out-the-vote operatives rallying the city’s voters to the polls throughout the day.
The Kerry faithful in Philadelphia included the sick, the elderly and the homeless, as well as extremely large proportions of the city’s African-American and Latino populations. The biggest question remaining unanswered at this point is whether the trends that shaped the urban vote here will play out similarly in Cleveland, Ohio — on which the fate of the presidential election now rests.
If Cleveland breaks as Philadelphia did with regard to turnout and overwhelming support for Kerry, the state of Ohio could go down to the wire — perhaps even resulting in a rerun of the 2000 recount in Florida — thus leaving open a number of mathematical possibilities for the Electoral College. If not, the battle for the presidency could be over by morning.
7:00 p.m.
It now seems likely that overall voter turnout in Philadelphia will be high, which is news that favors John Kerry in this crucial battleground state. The bad news for Kerry, however, is that lines with waits estimated at three to four hours have formed at several polling sites throughout the city and its suburbs, which could hinder turnout among late voters and balance out the Democrats’ strong start.
The official Election Day began here with high energy and excitement, as Democratic operatives, get-out-the-vote volunteers and legal observers met voters at the polls, watching carefully for intimidation and illegitimate challenges by Republican poll-watchers. At this point, I have heard of only a few serious voting controversies in Philadelphia, and even those seem to have been settled fairly quickly. However, Election Protection, a national non-profit effort, has reported receiving thousands of calls today from throughout the country, some of which are certain to have originated in the battleground of Philadelphia.
As for the Democrats’ efforts to get out the vote in this city, it seems difficult to imagine a more extensive Election Day campaign. With radio ads featuring Bill Clinton airing almost continuously, airplanes flying “Vote” banners over the city throughout the day and 12-foot cardboard likenesses of John Kerry greeting locals in Rittenhouse Square and on Broad Street, Philadelphia residents couldn’t help but encounter the election, and more specifically, the Democratic campaign, nearly every minute of the day.
But with the actual turnout numbers still unknown, the swaying power of Philadelphia on the race for Pennsylvania’s 21 electoral votes remains up in the air. Naturally, that race is, as it was 12 hours ago, very much in play as the polls near closing time.
6:59 a.m.
I went for a walk down Allegheny Avenue in North Philadelphia just after 5 a.m. today. The streets were quiet, serene and almost stilled in time, with the only motion coming from the occasional SEPTA bus kicking off its morning route. It was the cool, pre-dawn darkness of Election Day 2004, and this was the calm before the storm.
I strolled for a few short blocks, from 17th to Broad, sizing up what could be some of the most influential streets in the nation with regard to the outcome of today’s battle for the presidency. In that short stretch, I counted 23 Kerry/Edwards signs on the telephone poles alone.
This, of course, was nothing surprising or revealing; it’s long been obvious that few on these streets would consider casting their ballots for anyone but John Kerry. But in an election this tight, the name of the game is turnout — and while Republicans are working to mobilize their supporters in the conservative bastions of central Pennsylvania, Democrats are betting the house on the largely minority vote of Philadelphia.
It’s an obvious calculation here that the size of Kerry’s lead coming out of Philadelphia could dictate the direction of Pennsylvania’s 21 electoral votes. In 2000, Al Gore carried the city by 348,223 votes — enough to propel him to a 51 percent-46 percent statewide victory over George W. Bush. This year, John Street, Philadelphia’s Democratic mayor, has publicly predicted a 350,000-vote-margin for Kerry here; but some political experts have called even that favorable projection a bluff — an intentionally low figure intended to hold down expectations and avoid voter complacency.
On MSNBC’s Hardball Sunday night, host Chris Matthews, a Philadelphia native, gave Street a suspicious smirk when the mayor threw out the number 350,000, commenting briskly, “I heard you’re aiming at higher than 350.” Indeed, it is possible, on account of thousands of new registered voters and an almost city-wide anti-Bush sentiment, that the gap coming out of Philadelphia could be substantially higher than the mayor’s prediction.
But, of course, it could also be much lower. Despite the excitement surrounding this election, the Democrats’ 2000 effort — which, like this one, included extensive registration and mobilization campaigns in the months leading up to Election Day — may be difficult to top. And Philadelphia’s voter turnout numbers have shifted so drastically in the past three presidential races (a 19-percentage-point range of fluctuation) that they’re almost impossible to project for today’s election.
On the flip-side, the Bush take in this city seems relatively predictable. In all likelihood, somewhere between 100,000 and 110,000 Philadelphia voters will cast ballots for the President, and they’ll hail in large part from a handful of moderate and Republican-leaning neighborhoods of the Northeast.
What this means is that the margin that Street and Matthews discussed — and that Kerry’s hopes in Pennsylvania may hinge on — has very little to do with the issues, and perhaps even less to do with the candidates. Rather, it depends almost solely on voter turnout.
So what will determine the number of people that head to the polls today in Philadelphia, which could sway Pennsylvania, which could sway the nation? A number of factors, but four stand out as the most important: weather, wait times at polling places, Republican challenges and Democratic turnout efforts. Here’s a quick review as they stand at this hour.
Weather
Despite earlier projections of afternoon rain, local weather outlets are now calling Philadelphia precipitation-free at least until the evening. The very slight chance of rain before 8 p.m. could affect late voters and stragglers approaching the polls at closing time, but for the most part, the casting of ballots should proceed here without any major obstructions from Mother Nature. With temperatures in the mid-to-upper-50s throughout the day, the climate should be perfectly bearable for those walking to the polls or waiting in outdoor lines.
Wait Times at the Polls
With get-out-the-vote volunteers and Democratic operatives working to shuffle as many Philadelphia residents to the polls as possible in the morning hours, the possibility of long lines at certain polling places is a serious concern among Kerry supporters. This could be especially true at sites with Republican poll-watchers challenging voters — a factor that could, in some cases, tack on serious waiting time to otherwise efficient balloting sites.
Republican Challenges
There has been much discussion here about Republican poll-watchers attempting to challenge, confuse and intimidate potential voters, and at the very least add delays to lines at polling places in minority and low-income neighborhoods, which are expected to favor Kerry by huge margins. The impact of this variable on the election is a very real concern among Democrats here, and party operatives and community lawyers have been planning their response for months. If things get nasty right out of the gate, which they may, look for a lawsuit by 9 a.m.
The Democrats’ GOTV Effort
Mayor Street has predicted that more than 15,000 Democratic operatives and volunteers will be working to turn out the city’s voters throughout the day. They’ll be making phone calls, knocking on doors, assisting voters with transportation and providing legal assistance when necessary. The product of one of the oldest and strongest political machines in the nation, this get-out-the-vote effort is exactly what national Democrats had in mind when they worked to re-elect the mayor a year ago. Its strength, or lack thereof, could easily sway the state on its own.
At this point, it’s difficult to tell how these four factors will actually play out — from the possibility of evening rain to the prospect of an Election Day legal battle — but soon enough we’ll find out. In fact, this whole story will begin to unfold in less than one minute.
