Ward: Republicans more motivated to vote
Written by Lisa Renee Ward | | lward@toledofreepress.comAs we turn to November, what messages can we decipher from the May 4 outcome?
Apathy still tops the charts, at least for Democrats and the unaffiliated. Out of 314,892 registered voters in Lucas County, the unofficial election results report 52,493 cast ballots. At close to 17 percent, that puts us below the state average of 22.3 percent for the primary election. It is not the lowest turnout in recent primary election history for Lucas County — in 2002, voter turnout was 14.6 percent with 40,080 votes cast from 275,007 registered voters.
The unofficial results count 111,632 registered Democrats and 37,258 registered Republicans in Lucas County with 26,263 Democrats and 20,155 Republicans casting ballots during the May primary election. With 6,057 Lucas County voters opting for issue only or third-party ballots out of the 166,002 Lucas County unaffiliated voters, it is that group that was least represented at the voting machine.
Not every race encompasses all of Lucas County and some extend outside of Lucas County, so there are variations in voter turnout percentages. In the Edna Brown versus Joe McNamara Ohio Senate District 11 race,
25.4 percent of the eligible Democrats cast ballots with Brown’s central city support adding to her numbers over McNamara, 10,572 to 8,325.
Tom Waniewski, who was unopposed, received less votes in total, 8,188, but 59.2 percent of registered Republicans in the Ohio Senate District 11 district voted.
Marcy Kaptur defeated Democrat opponent Dale Terry by 90.19 percent in Lucas County with 22,305 votes versus his 2,425. For all of the U.S. Congressional 9th District, Kaptur’s numbers were 33,352 (86.48 percent) versus Terry’s 5,216 (13.52 percent). On the Republican side for the 9th Congressional, Jack Smith is not going to Washington, despite the support of many local Tea Party members. Smith’s 5,472 (30.91 percent) in Lucas County; 8,270 (28.73 percent) in total for the district was not enough to surpass Rich Iott’s 12,232 (69.09 percent) in Lucas County and 20,514 (71.27 percent) district wide.
Three hundred and eighteen residents of Lucas County opted to vote for Libertarian Party 9th Congressional candidates. Jeremy Swartz’s 170 county and 201 district votes topped Joseph Jaffe’s 148 in Lucas and 179 district.
Ted Strickland with running mate Yvette McGee-Brown received 22,544 votes in Lucas County with 23.5 percent of Democrats casting ballots compared to 54.1 percent of Republicans casting ballots for John Kasich and his running mate Mary Taylor. Kasich/Taylor received 16,848 votes in Lucas County. Statewide, 735,790 Republicans said yes to that ticket with 620,963 Democrats voting for Strickland/Brown.
George Sarantou gets a second try at running for Lucas County Commissioner, winning the Republican slot with 8,086 votes, followed by Dan Steingraber with 5,805 and Andy Glenn with 4,257 out of 18,148 total Republican votes cast.
Carol Contrada with 6,110 votes will face Sarantou in November. Ben Krompak with 5,257, Michael Zychowicz with 3,907, Art Jones with 3,430, Earl Murry with 2,340 and Tim Porter with 1,555 sum up the breakdown of the 22,599 Democratic votes cast in that race.
Keila Cosme ran unopposed for the Democrat spot on the Ohio 6th District Court of Appeals. She received 15,849 votes in Lucas County and 31,086 total for that district. Cosme will face Steve Yarbrough, the Republican primary winner in Lucas County with 7,765 votes and 19,525 district votes. He and the other two Republican candidates, Robert Christiansen (7,423 Lucas, 14,685 district) and Fritz Hany (1,398 Lucas, 7,845 district) split the 16,586 Lucas County and 42,055 district totals.
The Jon Stainbrook versus Jeff Simpson battle created mixed electoral results. In Lucas County out of 9,310 votes, Stainbrook received 4,045, losing to Jonathan Binkley, who had 5,265 votes for the Republican state central committee 11th District seat. For the Republican District 2 state committee spot, the totals for all of the district gave Paul Hoag a win with 9,995 (3,583 Lucas County) to Jim Hoover’s 7,267 (2,470 Lucas County) with a total of 17,262 votes in the district, 6,053 of those votes from Lucas County.
The Stainbrook faction may have lost the state central committee spots, but Meghan Gallagher with 4,560 votes defeated Lisa Simpson’s 3,627 votes for the state committee woman 11th District seat. The Secretary of State reported on May 5 that there were 947 absentee ballots and 428 provisional ballots that had not been counted for Lucas County; some of the precinct central committee race outcomes could change depending on those outstanding ballots. The final outcome as to Simpson versus Stainbrook will not be known until the upcoming organizational meeting.
During the next six months, the Democratic Party will have to motivate its base, the Republican Party will have to keep it motivated and both sides will have to lure the unaffiliated to come out to vote.
Toledo Free Press contributor Lisa Renee Ward is operator of the political blog www.GlassCityJungle.com.
Tags: City of Toledo, Glass City Jungle, Shredding the Curtain
Wait until November, everyone will learn how the
This comment was posted on May 7th, 2010 at 12:42 pmmany, many Democrats have learned, changed their opinions, and votes because the many Democrats currently in office scammed them for
their votes in the many recent elections.