A Preview of the Arizona Presidential Preference Primary 2008

In Arizona, one must be a registered member of either major party to vote in the primary. The result is both candidates with the greatest appeal to Independents — Obama and McCain — are somewhat disadvantaged.

Were the primaries open, McCain and Obama would be assured of victory. McCain will win in any case, being a favorite-son candidate in Arizona, but the exclusion of independents may be the factor that allows Clinton to prevail over Obama in Arizona.

Arizona is a proportional delegate state for Democrats, so a close contest between Clinton and Obama will merely split the 56 pledged delegates fairly evenly. Neither candidate will take much delegate advantage from the contest, whichever candidate wins. The GOP on the other hand, has chosen a state-wide, winner-take-all allocation of their 53 delegates. This has reduced the incentive for any other Republican hopeful to campaign in Arizona, as second place is of no real value.

Both Conventional Wisdom and polls indicate an easy win for McCain, despite deep dislike for the Senator in the anti-immigrant and religious factions of his own state party. Many will be casting protest votes for Romney, Huckabee, or Paul – but it’s precisely the diffusion of that outrage against McCain among three candidates that will likely keep McCain’s home state safe.

Senator Obama is currently surging everywhere in the Tsunami states, but it would be a huge upset were he to win in Arizona. He has trailed in Arizona by double digits until very recently. Luckily for Obama, the exclusion of Independents from the Democratic primary isn’t complete, as they were able to re-register as Democrats if they wanted to vote for Obama, but those voters will be sorely missed by Obama on election day. At least 10,000 independents across the state have re-registered for this election, and that may yet be an important factor as the race has tightened so much.

The popular Democratic Governor of Arizona, Janet Napolitano, stunned many Democrats by choosing to endorse Obama, despite a long relationship with the Clintons, and being widely considered a moderate in the genre of Bill Clinton, who started her political career with an appointment as US Attorney for Arizona. The strength of Napolitano’s endorsement may cause a lot of Arizona Democrats to reconsider their choices. In addition, most Edwards supporters in Arizona seem to be drifting to Obama, including the influential Southern Arizona Congressman Raul Grijalva, who was supporting Edwards, but has now endorsed Obama.

Clinton is certainly not taking Arizona for granted. Her campaign sent her husband to Phoenix and the candidate herself to Tucson in the days before the election. Arizona is seen by many as a bell-weather of national viability because of its demographics. Arizona was nearly chosen as an early caucus state this cycle, but was edged out by Nevada. Arizona’s large, heavily Republican exurbs, quickly growing Hispanic population, and large retired population, among other factors, make Arizona a microcosm of the nation as a whole. Thus, a win in Arizona for the Democrat will be a signal of national appeal and viability to many in the political establishment and media conferring benefits far beyond just the delegates at stake.

Polling for the Democratic contenders is currently within the margins of error heading into the election with 10-15% of the electorate still undecided. The Arizona primary will depend on decisions taken by those undecideds in the polling booths on election day. When last-minute decisions determine an election, it is usually the emotional appeal of a candidate’s campaign that is decisive. The use of inspiring themes of hope, optimism, and vision may gives the needed advantage to Obama’s insurgent campaign.

Written for The Independent of London.

UPDATE: Post=Primary Wrap-up

The result was no real surprise to anyone who hadn’t gotten campaign
fever due to Obama’s late surge nationally. Everyone expected an easy
Clinton victory in Arizona up until mid-January when Obama started
getting some movement in the polls here. However, polling just prior to
primary (43-41) suggested it would be a tighter than it eventually was
(51-42).

Clinton performed as well, if not better than expected among Hispanics,
carrying heavily Hispanic Congressional Districts 4 and 7 easily.
Apparently, Raul Grijalva’s endorsement in CD 7 didn’t help much in
southern Arizona.

Nor did Janet Napolitano’s unexpected endorsement seem to help much
state-wide. Exit polling indicates that the Kennedy endorsements didn’t
carry much weight either.

But the true key to Clinton’s victory here in Arizona and in all other
states where she prevailed was the massive turn-out of women. 62% of
Democratic voters on Tuesday in Arizona were women, a 24% spread
between the sexes. Those women broke 53 to 40% for Clinton (the balance
going with Edwards, presumably on early ballots). Every state had very
strong female turnout among the Democrats, but in those states were
women broke strongly for Clinton, it made the difference and won the
day for Hillary.

The result of McCain’s very strong showing in Arizona and most other
states means that he’ll likely be the GOP nominee, which is bad news
for Arizona Democrats. His presence at the top of the ticket will write
off Arizona in the minds of the eventual Democratic Presidential
campaign and likely have an effect down-ticket. That’s bad news since
Arizona Democrats were hoping for a strong Democratic ticket to help
them hold newly won Congressional seats in CD 5 and 8, and to win new
ones in CD 1 and 3. Democrats were also looking at a realistic
possibility of taking over one or both houses of the state legislature
in 2008. They’ll have to work much harder to overcome the allure of
McCain on the ticket for Arizona’s conservative and independent voters.