Black Turnout & the 2014 Midterms
October 28, 2014
Today the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies released Black Turnout & the 2014 Midterms by Professors Andra Gillespie and Tyson King-Meadows, which examines the impact of black voters in determining competitive U.S. Senate and Governors’ races in thirteen states.
Click here for the report.
Key Findings:
- Black voters are a critical component of the electorate in eight competitive U.S. Senate contests (AR, CO, GA, KS, KY, LA, MI, NC) and nine competitive gubernatorial contests (CO, CT, FL, GA, IL, KS, MD, MI, WI).
- While black voter share generally declines in midterm elections, in five of the competitive states the black voter share was higher in the 2010 midterms than in the 2008 presidential (CT, FL, GA, IL, LA).
- Among the competitive states, AR, KS, and KY had the lowest voting rates among black voters in the 2010 midterms.
- MI, WI, NC, and KY witnessed the steepest declines in black voter turnout from 2008 to 2010 among the competitive states.
- If the black vote share in 2014 is identical to that in the 2010 midterms, 2014 will be a challenging year for Democrats.
- A highly mobilized black Democratic voting bloc would make it numerically possible for Democrats and Independent candidates to win outright majorities in U.S. Senate races in CO, MI, and KS, and gubernatorial races in MD and IL, and possibly FL and KS.
For Press Inquiries, Contact:
- Prof. Andra Gillespie: angille@emory.edu, or contact Megan McRainey at 404-727-6167
- Prof. Tyson King-Meadows: tkingmea@umbc.edu, or 410-455-2158
Click on the following links for some of the coverage of the report: Black Enterprise, Christian Science Monitor, the Hill, MSNBC, the Nation, Salon, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post
