On November 2, the California Secretary of State published the voter registration tally as of October 22, 2012. The previous official state tally had been as of September 7. By far the most dramatic change between those two dates was the increase in the Libertarian registration, from 94,620 in September, to 108,736 in October. The party’s percentage of the total registration increased in 56 of the 58 counties; only two of California’s smallest-population counties, Mariposa and Mono, declined.
Unless the definition of “party” is amended, parties will go off the ballot in November 2014 unless they have registration of at least 1% of the number of votes cast in November 2014. No one can know what that number will be. But it probably will be less than 10,873,600, because the November 2010 turnout was 10,300,800. Therefore, the Libertarian Party can reasonably expect to meet the requirement, although any change in the party’s numbers by then is possible, in either direction.
Other parties that increased their share of the registration include the Democratic, American Independent, Americans Elect, and Justice Parties.
The number of voters registered “No party preference” declined slightly. Below are the September 2012 percentages, and the October 2012 percentages, for each party and for independents:
Democratic 43.33%, 43.66%
Republican 30.11%, 29.36%
Amer. Indp. 2.52%, 2.61%
Green .634%, .630%
Libertarian .548%, .596%
Peace & Freedom .343%, .340%
Amer. Elect .017%, .018%
non-qualified parties 1.22%, 1.84%
no party preference 21.28%, 20.94%
Among the unqualified parties, the Reform Party declined in raw numbers, the Justice Party increased in both raw numbers and percentagewise, and the Constitution Party increased in raw numbers but declined percentagewise.
Just checked my calendar. Not April Fools Day. Not Easter. Not Christmas. Whoah! I guess Thanksgiving came early this year…
I acquired a CD of the registered Libertarian voters in Riverside County on October 25, and found out that Riverside County now has more than 4900 registered Libertarians – nearly a thousand more than the previous high.
We did a mailing promoting Gary Johnson and Prop 34 as well as No on Prop 30 & Prop 38 to the active voters on that list.
With much due respect, the valid comparison of voter turnout is to the most recent Presidential election in 2008. Over 13,500,000 people voted in CA in 2008 so it is reasonable to expect that the requirement will be roughly 135,000 registrations.
That said it’s obviously a good sign for the LP to be the fastest growing party in CA.
my 19 year old son registered to vote…. just in time… and he registered as a Libertarian. talk about how to get on my good side.
#3, the number of people who vote in presidential years has no legal significance. The California definition of party only talks about 1% of the number of voters in a gubernatorial (midterm) year. In all states, always, the turnout in midterm years is always well below the presidential year turnout.
2014 in not a Presidential election year. So 2010 would be the relevant year not 2008. So for 2010 out of 23,551,699 registered voters only 10,300,392 voted. So 1% is 103,000? Given a 4% growth in registered voters you might need 108,000?
w00000000000000t wooooot GO LIBERTARIANS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (you can tell I’m excited)
Great job California LP leadership!
@5 & @6 Gotcha. Obviously, I thought it was each election cycle.
So the “We Like Women” Party has more voter registration than both the Justice and Constitution Parties? Put their presidential candidate in the third party debates!
Great news! And, hopefully, whichever statist presumably “wins” the presidential election this year will be able to add to those Libertarian numbers over the next four years since our troubles have only just begun.
It would be a terrible mistake for the LP to sit back and rely on these numbers.
The CA LP needs to start an organization and registration drive to boost its registration numbers well above the required numbers and to organize a separate county affiliate in each and every county in the state. Otherwise, don’t be surprised when 20,000 registrations suddenly disappear when it comes time for the official tally to determine party status. Never trust the Sec of State anywhere not to pull a last minute surprise.
Remember what happened this year in PA. Remember the tricks used against the LP in MI and OK.
Close is never safe.
Start a CA LP voter registration and organization drive by the end of 2012.
Please.
#12, the county election officials are the ones who compile the data. The Secretary of State just receives the county data and adds up the totals. Pennsylvania election administration has traditionally been highly partisan and highly flawed; California election administration is refreshingly professional and not tainted by partisanship and is generally honest and reliable. California has some very good traditions.
Richard Winger,
Wow, you say “California election administration is refreshingly professional and not tainted by partisanship and is generally honest and reliable.”
Have you forgot the June, 2012 primary were all the
ballots except the American Independent Party’s was
wrong in San Francisco. In that election all ballots
were print with the label of the AIP.
Have you forgot in the Presidential Primary 2008, Los
Angeles County had a double bubble ballot so votes for
the AIP candidates for POTUS where counted for Obama
or Clinton and not Ed Noonan.
Other news the Constitution Party of California is growing in leaps and bounds also. It new figure is at
260 California Electors. That is way up there, when
Dr. Don Grundman took over the California Constitution
Party its number of electors stood at 73. Now that party’s registration is way up from its last registration total of 252, viz., a total of 8 new party
members over a 45 day period.
The American Independent Party of California is also up.
It is now at 477,129 California Electors. The Greens are up to 115,034 California Electors. The Libertarians
are up to 108,736 California Electors. The Peace & Freedom at 61,987 California Electors. The American Elect is at 3,313 California Electors.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg, Vice Chairman, American Independent Party of California.
Richard Winger
As you know registtration is up from the 15 day figure prior to the 2010 November election of 17,285,883. The
figure of 10,300,392, which works out at 1% to 103,004
electors.
The Libertarian Party registration is now at 108,736 electors, which is over the figure of 103,004. However,
the law in place 135 days before the 2012 primary will
not be the same in 2016.
The other factor at that time is the the Feuer Act (AB 1436)and VoteCal. That should have an impact on the
events that follow Election Code Section 5100(b), viz.,
after the November, 2014 gubernatorial election.
Voter registration 15 days before the 2010 gubernatorial
election was at 17,285,883 California Electors. However, only 10,300,392 of these electors voted. Now the figure of registered electors in California stands
at 18,245,970. This in an increase of 960,087 in two years. Yet the LP registration is just 5,732 in number
over the the figure of 103,004 of registration (as of
15 days prior to the November 2010 gubernatorial election).
Richard a question, when will the County Election Officials issue the “statement of voters and their
political affiliations” and the vote totals for the
2014 gubernatorial election in 2014? Does it then
follow that the Secretary of State can act prior to
the 135 day before the primary election in 2016, in the
year 2015?
What impact does the real time operation of VoteCal have
on the issue of the Libertarian Party being quailfied in California in 2016? Will there be two primaries in
2016 in California? What would happen if there was a
recall of Jerry Brown as Governor of California on the
status of the LP in California, if the recall was sucessful?
Thank you in advance for the answers. One other point,
if the vote in the 2014 gubernatorial election in 2014,
was 10,873,501 or above which would not be that hard based on a current registration of 18,245,970 the LP in
California would be a non qualified political party in
California.
I for one who like to know what that parties game plan is to remain qualified?
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg, Vice Chairman, American Independent Party of California
Does anybody know why the number of voters registered in non-qualified parties in Los Angeles County increased from 87,000 on May 21 (immediately before the June election) to 231,000 today? The number on September 7 (Richard’s basis for comparison above) was 128,000.
There was a previous discussion here about the “other” category in Los Angeles. I haven’t looked for it, but I seem to remember there being something about parties that used to be attempting to qualify and then gave up. Regardless of that, a 265% increase in five months needs to be explained.
Libertarians are hypocrites. They take government money just like everybody else. In 1997, the candidate for Governor of NJ was a teacher at Ramopo College-a state university! Murray Rothbard was jealous of Ayn Rand because she sold more books. He lived in a rent-controlled apartment in NY and then worked for University of Nevada at Las Vegas-a state university! Atlas Shrugged 2 left NY after 2 weeks before I could see it.
Be Rational @12 is correct, there should be a registration drive used as an excuse to organize all the counties as well as increase the margin.
That’s true even if the state elections were run by the archangels.
#16 The Other category had been relative steady for years, with jumps when a party qualified or became non-qualified.
In 1999, there were 224K Other Party voters, but both the Reform and P&F parties were actively attempting to qualify, and represented 71% of the Others, with only 66K Other Other Parties (OOP).
The Reform Party qualified in 2000, and the Other Party dropped to 136K, of which 74% was P&F.
By the time the Reform Party became non-qualified in 2003. The Other was 184K, with P&F and Reform representing 73%, and OOP having dropped to 51K, from 66K four years earlier. That OOP attrition looks comparable to the drops for Natural Law after they stopped running candidates, or Reform Party since they became non-qualified. This is likely due to voters becoming non-registered due to not voting, dying, moving from California, moving within the state. I doubt that huge numbers of ordinary voters change their registration simply to update the party. They may do so if they have to re-register when they move.
The P&F reqained qualified status in 2004, and Reform represented 50K of 99K Other voters. By 2006, just before the NLP became non-qualifed, this had dropped to Reform 32K of 82K Other. This was the modern low point of Other voters, as it jumped to 105K as the 22K NLP voters joined the rank of the Others.
3 years later by the first 2012 report, the Others was 115K, but Reform had dropped to 21K and NLP around 12K (a guess, since the NLP has never sought to re-qualify, but once it was off the registration forms, few are going to write it in. But that means an increase of OOP from 50K to 85K.
There were a few counties that appears to have started classifying “Independent” write-ins as Others rather than DTS. This was particularly true of Santa Cruz County where the voter registrar’s web page emphasized that “Independent” was distinct from “Decline To State”. By 2008, “Other” voters had increased to 3.54% in Santa Cruz. Since Proposition 14, it appears that Santa Cruz has decided that “Independent” is the same as “No Party Preference”, and “Other” has dropped to below 1%. Fresno County was up to 2.99%, but has since dropped back down to just above 1%. I didn’t find anything on the Fresno web site that indicated an active policy of encouragement, so it may have been simply a matter of internal classification.
The number of “Other” voters has surged this year, but it is heavily concentrated in two large counties, Los Angeles and Alameda. Alameda has gone from 2.49% to 5.38%, and Los Angeles from 2.16% to 4.86%. These are the only two counties that are above the statewide average of 1.84%, which indicates how anomalous their classification is. Their large population is also important in this regard (LA has just over 1/4 of registered voters).
At the first report this year, in January, Los Angeles was at 0.86% Other, about where it had been for the preceding years. The increase may be tied into new registrations.
January 3-April 6 +22K Other/+59K Total
April 6-May 21 +28K Other/+22K Total
May 21-September 7 +40K Other/+53K Total
September 7-October 22 +104K Other/+246K Total
(total registrations increased 5.5% in 45-day period between final two pre-election reports).
The increases are net, of course; so 42.3% of new registrations probably aren’t Other. It wouldn’t surprise me if Los Angeles had close to a million registration changes, when you consider in-county moves, county-to-county moves, and name changes. The moves could have happened over the past few years, and are only being picked up now as registration drives are catching voters who hadn’t updated their registrations at the time of their move.
Los Angeles has also lost 63K (6.7%) of its No Party Preference (NPP) voters this year. If you combine the NPP and Other voters, the net increase is 34.2% of the total increase, which is not too remarkable, given that DTS/NPP registrations have increased from 12.9% to 20.9% from 1999 to 2012 statewide.
So the increasing share of Other voters from 0.86% to 1.34% to 1.96% to 2.83% to 4.86%, is likely tied to the election-year registration drives, with the 2% increase over 45 days due to the surge in late registrations. Typically registrations drop from the end of one election year to the start of the next, about 1-1/2 years later.
Alameda County has seen a similar surge in Other registrations, and now leads the State with 5.38%, almost three times the state average. By contrast, neighboring Contra Costa has dropped from 0.58% to 0.26% just this year.
Alameda started its increase from around April 2010, 60 days before the June primary. Since this was before Proposition 14 was approved, and 9 months before it went into effect, it doesn’t appear to be directly tied to Proposition 14.
Alameda went from 0.77% in April 2010; to 2.49% in January 2012; to 3.70% in September 2012; to 5.38% in October 2012.
Total registrations in Alameda were stagnant from 2010 to September 2012, followed by a 7.5% increase in 45 days. But Others increased by 12.3% in those 6-1/2 weeks. From April 2010 to October 2012, Others increased by 660% (7.6 fold), from 5742 to 43,653. Of those 43,653 Others, only 419 are for parties seeking to qualify, of which Reform has 365. When Reform was last qualified, in 2002, it had 1395 registrants.
Alameda now has 36% more Other voters than the combined total of American Independent, Green, Libertarian, Peace&Freedom, and Americans Elect voters.
While Others was increasing by 38,000; DTS/NPP has decreased by 9,000. But collectively Others + DTS/NPP has increased 16.7%.
Registrars in Alameda and Los Angeles appear to be doing the same thing, and it does not appear to be directly related to Proposition 14, since the change started in Alameda before Proposition 14 was even voted on, let alone gone into effect.
I suspect it is new/updated registrations getting classified as “Others” where prior to the change they would have been classified as DTS or NPP. The highest relative increases were in Dublin, Emeryville, and Berkeley. The former two are the two fastest growing cities in the county, while Berkeley should have a high churn rate because of the university. On the low end were Alameda, Livermore, Oakland, Piedmont, and San Leandro, generally low growth areas (Livermore had slightly higher growth, but probably has low churn as a very wealthy community).
Note that “high” and “low” rates of increase are in terms of Alameda County. “Low” means an increase of 4.5X in 3-1/2 years, while “High” is around 8X. Most other areas of the State “Normal” means no change.
There are 4 smaller counties that have seen massive increases in Other voters, and it has all been in the last 6-1/2 week period.
Mariposa 95 (0.99%) to 153 (1.42%)
Merced 108 (0.12%) to 1773 (1.79%)
Sutter 187 (0.47%) to 525 (1.24%)
Yuba 30 (0.11%) to 311 (1.03%)
Only in Sutter does it appear that the increase was at the expense of NPP.
There were also large relative increases in 4 small counties, but these are on very small numbers of voters: Alpine, Colusa, Inyo, and Lassen.
Jim Riley,
Do you know if the listing of “independent” in Santa Cruz County” was caused by the HAVA registration forms?
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg, Vice Chairman, American Independent Party of California
#20 See http://www.votescount.com/parties.htm
Read down toward the middle, where it suggests that voters check other and write in “Nonpartisan” or “Independent”, vs. checking Decline To State. They’ve edited that page since Proposition 14 was approved, so it is really starting to get screwed up.
The HAVA instructions for California have not been updated since Proposition 14. They do confirm that “political party preference” and “political party affiliation” DO NOT mean “preference for a Section 338 party” or “affiliation with a Section 338 party.” but rather “What the voter indicated on their registration form, which they signed was truthful and correct”.
Santa Cruz has weekly registration counts.
http://www.votescount.com/regbyweek.htm
In the earliest reports (November 26, 2001 to April 30, 2002) they include a category of Non-Partisan which is distinct from DTS or Miscellaneous. The October 2, 2001 (154 days before March 2002 primary) state report combined Non-Partisan and Miscellaneous combined as Miscellaneous. Other State reports combine the Non-Partisan with DTS (this is likely based on how Santa Cruz filled in the form sent to the SOS).
Beginning with May 6, 2002, Santa Cruz dropped the non-partisan category and the number of DTS voters jumped. This continued until May 12, 2008. In the May 19, 2008 report, the non-partisan voters appear to have been moved to Miscellaneous, as that category increases by 3800 and the DTS drops by 3800. That showed up on the State report (15 days before June 2008 primary). Santa Cruz had 3.60% Miscellaneous, while statewide it was 0.67%.
Santa Cruz did not appear to have actively promoted the use of “Independent” or “Non-Partisan” as their Miscellaneous category did not increase that much during 2008, when there would have been a large number of new registrations – or voters may have been registering Democratic to vote in the 2008 presidential primary. But it really kicked in during 2010, and in the last report before the November 2010 election, Santa Cruz Miscellaneous was 6.13%, roughly eight times the statewide average of 0.74%.
Perhaps the SOS noticed, since the February 2011 report shows Santa Cruz back at 0.93%. The county’s own report beginning with March 1, 2011 show separate categories of NPP, DTS, and Miscellaneous. It also shows Reform and WP (Worker’s Party?) as separate items. NPP was 8152 vs. 1099 for Miscellaneous. This was two months after Proposition 14 went into effect.
NPP disappeared from the county report after March 23, 2011, only to return on December 13, 2011. It appears that all new registrations were treated as NPP, as the DTS dropped (or maybe the only way to get added as DTS was to use an old registration form).
By May 29, just before the June 2012 primary, NPP had climbed to 11,436, which was 7.78% of county registrations.
Beginning with July 16, the NPP and DTS categories were combined under DTS (which is now reported by the State as NPP).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXHX5Yds2wA&