JOHN MCCARTHY, FLORIDA TODAY
Brevard County remains GOP country, a fact underlined by Republican John McCain getting more than 54 percent of the vote here during last month’s presidential election. But Democrats have gained ground on the Space Coast, a FLORIDA TODAY analysis of newly released voting data shows.
That, too, was reflected in the presidential vote, with President-elect Barack Obama 3 percentage points better here than fellow Democrat John Kerry in 2004.
The increase in the number of Democrats who voted this year far outstripped GOP gains.
Fueling the increased Democratic turnout was a surge in minority voters. The number of minorities who cast ballots this year was up 47 percent from 2004. The increase for white voters was 4 percent.
The presence of Obama, the first major-party black presidential candidate, undoubtedly played the key role.
“It was high, and Barack Obama was definitely the reason,” University of South Florida political scientist Susan MacManus said of the minority turnout.
Surprising, though, might be Obama’s support among Hispanics. The Hispanic vote in Florida has leaned GOP for three decades.
But the state’s non-Cuban Hispanic population has been growing steadily, especially in Central Florida. Democrats and Republicans have described the group as “up for grabs.”
A survey released Thursday found that 57 percent of Hispanics in Florida voted for Obama. In 2004, 56 percent of Hispanics here voted for George Bush.
The survey didn’t include information at the county level, but an examination of race and party of people who voted here suggests that Democrats are gaining strength here also.
In 2004, 39.2 percent of Hispanics who voted in Brevard were Democrats, compared with 36.7 percent who were Republicans.
This year, 43.8 percents of Hispanics who voted were Democrats. Only 31.9 percent were Republicans.
“I think the big surprise was how well Obama did among the Hispanics,” MacManus said.
Overall, there were 23,850 more people who cast ballots in Brevard this year than in 2004.
More than 10,000 of those were Democrats, while fewer than 4,000 were Republicans. The rest had no party affiliation or membership in minor political parties.
“People got involved who had not been involved before,” said Amy Tidd, who was chairwoman of the Brevard Democratic Party for much of the past two years.
Frank Montelione, vice chairman of Brevard Republicans, points out, though, that turnout numbers suggest the GOP did well with independent voters here.
McCain got 157,536 votes here. That’s 27,771 more votes than the number of Republicans who voted.
Obama, on the other hand, got 127,561 votes. That’s only 19,744 more votes than the number of Democrats who turned out.
“I have to assume that we drew from the (no-party affiliates) and independents,” Montlione said.
A report by Project Vote, a nonprofit group that pushes for greater minority and low-income voter participation, found the number of minority voters was up significantly in the state — and nationwide.
“I think there was definitely an attempt to participate in the process in a way they haven’t been able to before,” said John Anderson, chairman of Brevard Republicans. Anderson, himself a black man, said black churches and civil-rights groups played a pivotal role in increasing black turnout.
The Project Vote study also found nearly three-quarters of a million fewer whites nationwide voted this year than in 2004. In Florida and Brevard, the number of white voters was up, though the increases were smaller than for minority voters.
The question now is whether Democrats continue to make gains locally.
“Every month, we get more and more Democrats,” Tidd said, of increasing registration numbers.
Montelione said he sees the surge more as a one-time event.
“I think this was an Obama issue, not so much a Democrat-Republican issue,” he said.
Anderson said, as both Republican and black, he had no mixed emotions about Obama’s victory.
“I’m proud,” he said. “The business of partisan politics ends when the election is over.”
Read the original Florida Today article here.