Iowa Democrats have huge registration lead
A year ago tonight, the votes were counted and Barack Obama won the presidency and Democrats strengthened their holds in the two federal chambers. Republicans nationally and in Iowa licked their wounds, then looked ahead.
State Rep. Chris Rants, R-Sioux City, showing me a host of vote totals from various statehouse races on his laptop, pointed to where some of the statehouse elections could have turned for the GOP with not too many more votes. Rants said Republicans needed to do the grunt work of registering more voters to the party, then turning them out.
So are Republicans cutting into the voter registration lead of Democrats? From the early November voter registration totals from the Iowa Secretary of State office, Dems still are sitting on a very substantial lead, one of well over 100,000 people.
The number of active Democratic Party registrations is 682,641 compared to 577,789 registered Republicans (and with 704,824 active no party registrations in Iowa). If you throw the inactive registrations, the number becomes 723,626 for Democrats and 609,976 for Republicans.
Maybe many of those registered Democrats voted for Obama in 2008, have soured on him (and other Dems) and will switch for the 2010 election in which an Iowa governor position, U.S. Senate post and five congressional seats will be on the ballot. Or maybe that’s a substantial voter registration lead that gives Republican Party of Iowa Chairman Matt Strawn cause for concern.
Consider that the registration totals have barely moved in the last three months: At the beginning of August there were 683,117 Democrats and 577,223 Republicans. Basically, Democrats have dropped by about 475 and Republicans gained 550. Yeah, it’s 12 months out, but the numbers provide an interesting snapshot.
November 4th, 2009 at 7:04 am
Republicans have a branding problem. They were once clearly labelled as the “limited government” brand. No longer. These days, it’s not clear what the party stands for, which is why folks are hesitant to register as a Republican, and why registered Republicans balk at introducing themselves as Republicans.
The Democrats are clearly the party of Big Government. Unless the Republicans clearly brand themselves as the party of Small Government (which also happens to be Constitutional), the numbers that Rants cites will continue.
And for those who mistakenly believe that the Republican party is already the party of limited government, I offer you McCain-Feingold, Bush’s Prescription Drug handout, and the selection of Dede Scozzafava and Charlie Crist as a Republican-endorsed candidates.
There was a reason why someone really smart once said, “Give me liberty or give me death.” Until the Republicans get busy about the business of protecting our freedoms instead of trying to implement government solutions, the registration numbers won’t accelerate much.
November 4th, 2009 at 7:50 am
[...] Bret Hayworth of the Sioux City Journal notes that Democrats maintain a big lead in party registration. [...]