PHOENIX — As election officials would say, the “books are closed” for Arizona’s general election. Tuesday was the last day to register to vote, meaning any registrations received by the counties moving forward will have to wait until the next election cycle to cast a ballot.
ABC15 looked at the data for newly registered people in Maricopa just in the past month. They have no voter history in the state, they are not on any candidate contact lists and they have almost certainly not been polled. With elections being so close in the state, this group of 20,386 registered voters could play a major role in deciding who wins what.
A little over half of the 20,386 newly registered voters chose to not register with any political party. Of those that did, slightly more of them chose to align themselves with the Republican party.
They are mainly young, and over two-thirds of them are under the age of 35. In fact, there are more 18- to 24-year-old newly registered voters in the county than newly registered people over the age of 45. This is common since the numbers include people who have moved into the eligible voting age. In Arizona, it is simple to get a driver's license and register to vote at the same time using servicearizona.com.
State law does not include gender or ethnicity on voter registration forms but using some basic analysis of first and last names, ABC15 estimates that 53% of these brand-new registered voters are men, reversing a trend seen in the summer when more women registered to vote. It is also estimated that 16% of the new voters are Hispanic.
The reality is that not all these new registrants will vote in November. About 65% of all Arizonans voted in the last mid-term and only half voted in 2014. The biggest predictor of voting behavior is, by far, age. It’s estimated that a little over half of the new voters under 35 will vote and about 3 in 4 of those over 35 will cast a ballot.
In a tight election, the 8,717 older voters may make all the difference.
ABC15 found that 46% of them registered as independents, and 911 more of them are Republicans than Democrats. 50% are men and about 11% are Hispanic.
