Young voters not essential to Obama triumph

Traditional voting analyses examined voting precincts that were dominated by one ethnic or religious group: voters in a predominantly Jewish precinct in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn in the 1940 election, for instance.

More recently political scientists have examined exit poll data — samples of the electorate in a state or the entire country.

Of course, we still can look at a predominantly Latino or black congressional districts or counties. Census data can help us assess how black or Latino voters cast their ballots.

In Allendale County, South Carolina, for instance, Obama won 75 percent of the vote, making that his best county in a state he lost. That’s an actual vote count, not exit poll data.

According to the Census, 71 percent of Allendale County’s population is black. We can infer that most African-American voters in the county voted for Obama, but we still don’t know for certain how white and blacks voted in the county.

Nationally, the exit poll interviews indicated that:

• 61 percent of Obama's votes came from white voters; 90 percent of McCain's came from white voters.
• 23 percent of Obama's votes came from black voters; only one percent of McCain's came from African American voters.
• Latino voters accounted for 11 percent of Obama's vote and six percent of McCain's.
• Twenty-three percent of the Obama voters were under age 30 but only 13 percent of McCain backers were.

Surge of young voters?
NBC's Arumi said that while more people voted this time around than in 2004, that one age group did not turn out at a much higher rate than others did.

The purported “surge” of younger voters did happen, but it occurred at the same time as the number of voters of other ages also increased.

Video Mapping out a sea of blue Nov. 6: NBC's Political Director Chuck Todd looks at the Democratic party's dramatic gains in Congress. Nightly News

“Basically, the age distribution of voters looks the same as it did in 2004,” Arumi said.

In 2004, 9 percent of the electorate was aged 18-24; on Tuesday, the percentage grew by one point to 10 percent.

This single percentage point is pulled from the 40-49-year-old bracket.

The over-65 crowd remained the same: an estimated 16 percent of the electorate.

But what did shift is the vote preference of each group. Obama outperformed 2004 Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry with all age groups except seniors. His biggest gains were among those 25-29 years old.

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