Florida GOP's early vote spin: 96=120.

In 2008, with long lines forming at the early voting polls in South Florida, then-Republican Gov. Charlie Crist extended early voting hours by four hours daily for six days, or the equivalent of two full extra days.

In math terms, that would look like this: 4 X 6 = 24.

So that meant that, in 2008, the people of South Florida had 120 cumulative hours of early voting because the cumulative hours had been capped at 96.

In math terms, what Crist did looks like this: 96 + 24 = 120.

But you wouldn't know that from looking at the Republican Party of Florida's latest press release designed to give cover to Gov. Rick Scott for his likely refusal to keep the polls open longer this year. RPOF is good at math. It news that more early voting hours = more votes for President Obama.

"Florida has a law in regard to early voting--this law provides for 96 hours of operation for early voting locations," the RPOF statement says, "the exact same amount of hours as 2008."

Not quite. Not exact. Not the same.

It's true that, in 2008 and in 2011, the maximum statutory hours remain the same. But the actual early voting hours are not the same for about a quarter of the early voting electorate: those who live in South Florida's three big counties, Dade, Broward and Palm Beach. Duval, Hillsborough and Orange (the number three, four and five early vote counties, respectively) are also majorly affected. Add these six together, and the counties account for about 44 percent of the in-person early vote ballots cast.

But we'll stick to South Florida, where the polls were opened 120 total hours for early voting in 2008. Now it looks like 96. That's a real reduction of 24 hours, or 20 percent relative to 2008.

Here's the math: (120-96)/120=.2/100

3m FL ballots already cast; Dems open 59,000 early ballot lead over GOP. Is it enough for Obama?

More than 3 million Floridians have already voted, according to new early and absentee ballot (EVAB) numbers that show Democrats continue to add to their total lead over Republicans: about 59,000.

Democrats have cast 133,000 more early votes, Republicans cast about 74,000 more absentee ballots. That could be as much as a third of the electorate. (Totals below)

But is it enough for President Obama? In 2008, Obama had about a 280,000 cumulative early vote lead before the polls opened on Election Day. At the current rate of growth, it would take Obama nine more days to get there. But that would be Nov. 13, a week after the election. And early in-person voting ends Saturday.

Guess who cut early voting days? Republicans. In 2008, including an executive order from Gov. Charlie Crist, polls stayed open a cumulative 120 hours over 14 days. The Legislature and current Gov. Rick Scott cut those days to eight and capped cumulative hours at 96. Republicans point out that the new early voting law gives the right for early voting on weekends. But in South Florida, where a quarter of early voters cast ballots, citizens had two Sundays of early voting. Now they have only one.

There have been long lines, cries of disenfranchisement and even a "nightmare" of a problem for early voters. Democrats want Scott to exend early voting. Scott probably won't. Story is here.

Lawyers, watchdog groups patrol state in Obama-Romney showdown

TALLAHASSEE — It won't just be voters heading to the polls this week in Florida and other swing states, but thousands of lawyers and volunteers scrutinizing how ballots are handed out, scanned and stored inside precincts. Thousands more will stand outside to detect efforts to intimidate, disenfranchise or reward voters. In the post Bush vs. Gore era, this is what Democracy looks like. "The 2000 election scared the hell out of people," said Nate Persily, a political science professor at Columbia University who has studied election law. "Campaigns are now armed to the hilt with lawyers beforehand so they aren't caught off guard." Read more here.

2.7m Floridians have voted (30%?). Dems stretch early ballot lead to nearly 49,000 over Republicans

The early vote and absentee ballot data (EV/AB) is in, and it shows that Democrats on the fourth day of voting in-person voting extended their lead over total Republican ballots cast by about 48,600**.

In all, Democrats edged Republicans by 118,000 early vote ballots, but Republicans extended their absentee-vote lead to more than 69,000.

Nearly 2.7 million ballots have been cast out of a total 12 million registered voters, 75 percent of whom will probably vote. That means about 30 percent of the ballots are already in.

There's a dispute between the Republican and Democratic parties about what the numbers all mean. Republicans claim Democrats in 2008 were up by a total of 134,000 ballots at this time (four days into early voting). That number does seem high, and the Democrats say it's not true and that Republicans are playing fast and loose with the numbers.

It is true that total early voting is down by Dems from 134,000 to about 118,00 four days in. But that's not the net EVAB number. That's just early voting. And one of the reasons for the decline is that Democrats have shifted some of their early voters in 08 to being absentee-ballot voters in 2012. And Democrats have closed the big AB gap with the GOP by about two thirds since 08.

President Obama, however, clearly has a problem in the polls. They show him winning the early vote, however he's losing independents. About 450,000 have already cast ballots and they account for about 20 percent of the electorate.

Either way, Democrats are still up. A lead is a lead. But can they keep it through Election Day?

The totals for EV

Party	EV total	%
Dem	517,909	47%
Rep	399,687	36%
Ind	182,016	17%
Total	1,099,612

For AB

Party	AB total	%
Rep	686,671	44%
Dem	617,053	39%
Ind	264,691	17%
Total	1,568,415

Cumulative:

Party	Total	%
Dem	1,134,962	43%
Rep	1,086,358	41%
Ind	446,707	17%
Total	2,668,027

Note: The numbers might be slightly different later in the day when updates are posted. Lafayette County didn't post its data this morning

Palm Beach County GOP panic: Dems are "cleaning our clocks" (via WPTV)

There's a sense of worry among Palm Beach County Republicans. They're not just outnumbered 44-29 percent by Democrats. The Democrats are "cleaning our clocks" in both early and absentee ballots, according to a GOP email obtained by WPTV.

The Democrat-over-Republican spread: 54-27 percent as of yesterday morning. That's about 30,000 ballots. And there's a good chance that margin could be even bigger after another day of early voting.

From WPTV:

A memo obtained by NewsChannel5's Evan Axelbank, from an adviser to a local GOP campaign, says that the Democratic turnout effort is, "cleaning our clock."

The memo says, "The early and absentee turnout is starting to look more troubling."

It also says, "Even if Romney wins the state (likely based on polls), the turnout deficit in PBC will affect our local races."

At the Delray Beach early voting site, we saw a Democratic campaign operative, who was handing out sheets printed with the Democratic slate.

"Alright Democrats, you've got your cheat sheet here," said Robert Murstein, a Democratic party volunteer.

Murstein is carrying out his party's game plan.

With 2.3m Floridians having voted (a quarter of electorate?), Dems lead Reps by more than 41,000 ballots

The early and absentee-voting reports are in**and Democrats continue to roll up big margins over Republicans now that early voting, in its fourth of eight days, is underway. On Saturday and Sunday, Democrats wiped a lead that Republicans held with absentee ballots (which are typically mailed in).

As of this morning, Democrats' led by about 101,000 in early votes while Republicans had a more than 61,000-vote lead. Net Democratic advantage: more than 30,000 ballots. Monday marked the first day of non-weekend early voting, but there was an actual uptick in EV overall. (click here for yesterday's numbers and analysis. To see previous days, click the Florida Voters hyperlink)

Monday's heavy vote could be an anomaly (folks voting Monday because they rested Sunday or thought the polls would be too crowded). Or this could be a sign of the organization that the Obama campaign says it has. We'll see.

The numbers are big: 2.2 million people have already voted out of 11.9 million registered voters. If this presidential election is like the others, 75% of the registered voters will cast ballots. So instead of 18% of the electorate having voted, there's a chance it could be a quarter by now.

The early vote numbers:

Party	EV Total	%
DEM	391,238	48%
REP	290,368	36%
IND	133,698	16%
TOTAL	815,304

The absentee numbers:

Party	AB Total	%
REP	634,814	44%
DEM	574,122	40%
IND	240,563	17%
TOTAL	1,450,814

The totals

Party	EV/AB	%
DEM	965,360	43%
REP	925,182	41%
IND	374,261	17%
TOTAL	2,266,118

There's another measure of voting (or potential voting) to consider as well: outstanding absentee-ballot requests -- those people who have requested ballots and who have either not voted them or not yet mailed them back.

Party	ABs out	%
DEM	509,092	40%
REP	484,114	38%
IND	278,403	22%
TOTAL	1,271,609

**Note: This analysis relies on state data and two major counties, Duval and Palm Beach, weren't in this morning. Now they are and the post has been updated.

Seminole election chief Mike Ertel vs. the 'partisan' conventional wisdom

Mike Ertel, the elections supervisor of Seminole County,** is one of the few in the state who daily emails out data about early and absentee voting (AKA "EV/AB").

The emails also have an elections musing/lesson for the day that address some of conventional wisdom about elections that concern, for example, early voting and provisional ballots.

A sample:

Here's today, 10/29/2012:

Did You Know: As the election gets closer, some partisans will try to convince you up to 40% of provisional (eligibility verification) ballots are “thrown out.”  To be clear: 100% of provisional (eligibility verification) ballots cast will count if the voter is eligible.  100%.  One hundred percent. All of them.  100 percent.  Every single one.  100%.    Which ones aren’t counted? -- those which are cast by people who are either not registered to vote or otherwise not qualified to cast the ballots which they’ve requested.  However, if they are eligible to cast the ballot, it will be counted.  What percent of the time? -- that’s right; 100%

FL Dems beat GOP by 73,000 early votes by Monday, wipes out GOP absentee-vote lead. But....

In the first two days of in-person early voting, Florida Democrats wiped away a lead that Florida Republicans had run up thanks to the GOP's strong absentee-ballot program. In all, about 1.9 million ballots have been cast (about 16 percent of the 11.9 million voters)

As of this morning, Democrats cast a total of 73,000 more early in person ballots than Republicans, who had cast about 63,000 more absentee ballots, typically cast by mail. So it looks like a 10,000-vote edge for Democrats.

But it's probably smaller than that.

The Monday absentee ballot numbers aren't really updated because no mail is delivered Sunday. By averaging the daily percentage increases of the GOP absentee-vote lead, the total Democratic advantage could be as low as 2,000. Of course, it could be higher. This is just a projection.

Voter fraud? Voter suppression? Nah. Numbers show winning FL's all about ground game

If anyone wondered why the GOP-led Legislature reduced the number of in-person early-voting days in Florida, Saturday told you everything you needed to know.

Democrats turned out in force, casting about 49 percent of the roughly 300,000 votes in just 12 hours across the state. Republicans cast 35 percent of the in-person ballots.

Republicans prefer to vote by absentee ballots, which are typically mailed in. The GOP led Democrats by a whopping 66,000 ballots cast on Saturday. Democratic early voting cut that lead by 60 percent in a single day.

All told, 1.6 million Floridians had voted by Sunday morning.

And by Monday morning, when the previous day’s vote tallies are released, that number will grow by the hundreds of thousands. And there’s a chance Democrats could surpass Republicans in pre-Election Day ballots cast.

Sunday was a big day to get out the Democratic base — the black vote — as part of a “Souls to the Polls” rally. This was the only day available for after-church weekend voting because the Legislature eliminated early voting on the Sunday before Election Day.

“They’ve cut back the time, but they can’t cut back the line,” said the Rev. Al Sharpton, an MSNBC host and founder of the National Action Network, who stumped in South Florida this weekend.

“The lines are longer,” Sharpton said. “And they may be stronger.”

But the evidence of the longer, stronger lines also conflicts with a talking point from liberals: That the Legislature engaged in “voter suppression” by reducing the number of early-voting days from 14 to eight.

Before 2002, there was no early in-person voting at all. Since then, the Legislature has also expanded chances to cast absentee ballots in Florida. Absentee-ballot voting has gone on for almost a month. It’s easy to request and get one. Almost too easy.

So there’s plenty of time for anyone to cast a ballot (unless you’re a felon, which is a separate issue).

Meantime, conservatives are doing their own share of spinning.

The reduction of early voting hours was made in a package of legislative reforms designed to crack down on voter fraud. But the law didn’t touch absentee-ballot voting, which is the easiest way to commit voter fraud (and it’s not that easy to cast fake ballots, either, especially on a significant scale).

The GOP dominates absentee-ballot voting in Florida. So the GOP Legislature saw little reason to harm their vote-by-mail program. And when The Miami Herald began reporting about fraud issues related to absentee ballots in August, Republicans started complaining that the news media were trying to suppress the GOP vote.

Now that in-person and mail-in ballot voting is underway, there’s a wealth of new data for each side to complain and boast about.

More here

With 1.6m Floridians having voted, Dems cut GOP absentee vote-lead in half in 1st early vote day

In just 12 hours of in-person early voting Saturday, Florida Democrats swamped the polls so heavily that they ran up a more than 39,000-vote margin over Republicans out of the nearly 300,000 votes that were cast at polling stations.

The Democratic vote was so big that it cut a Republican lead, built up during a month's worth of absentee-ballot voting, by about 60 percent. As of Saturday morning, Republicans were ahead of Democrats by nearly 66,000 absentee ballots cast, or 5 percentage points.

Factor in the day's worth of Democratic early voting, and that GOP lead is now just above 26,300, or 1.6 points. Add in Duval, whenever those numbers come in, and the GOP lead should be even smaller.

Here are the absentee and early vote ballots combined:

Party	Total votes	Total %	REP edge
REP	684,744	43%	26,310
DEM	658,434	41%
IND	262,516	16%
Total	1,605,694

 The early vote numbers:

Party	EV votes	EV%	DEM EV edge
DEM	145,470	49%	39,522
REP	105,948	35%
IND	47,219	16%
TOTAL	298,637

 The absentee vote numbers:

Party	AB votes	AB%	REP AB edge
REP	578,796	44%	65,832
DEM	512,964	39%
IND	215,297	16%
Total	1,307,057

In the Democrats' favor: the eight days of early voting continues today. And It's the only Sunday of early voting, when African-Americans prefer to head to the polls after church for their "Souls to the Polls" rallies. The Legislature, in shortening the Democrat-heavy early voting days, eliminated the Sunday-before-Election Day early voting.