Talk Elections

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Washington GOP caucus on Saturday, March 3rd

The caucuses start at 10am PT / 1pm ET and run for no more than two hours.  However, various news sources suggest that the Washington GOP will not release results until 5pm PT / 8pm ET.  Not clear if that means they'll dump 100% of the results all at once.  Presumably, there'll be a million leaks of results on Twitter well before that.

CNN and AP results:

http://edition.cnn.com/election/2012/primaries/state/wa

link (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/files/elections/2012/by_state/WA_President_0303.html?SITE=AP&SECTION=POLITICS)

link (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/files/elections/2012/by_county/WA_President_0303.html?SITE=AP&SECTION=POLITICS)

Who else is hoping for 2008-style shenanigans?  :D

The GOP LD leader for my area returned my call by apologizing for the delay, saying he was having phone trouble and was having difficulties getting a hold of the key for the caucus site.  It was 8 PM on the night before the caucus.  If this is at all representative, I expect great things.

Here are the threads on the 2008 caucus fiasco, in case you're feeling nostalgic:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=70234.0

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=70313.0

Did the Democrats also have problems with their caucuses or is this incompetence only limited to the GOP ?

Summary?

Only the GOP.

Even if they had, Obama's landslide didn't leave any room for complaints.

;D  ;D  ;D

Whatever happens, I'm sure a lot of people on the Internet will be convinced that another election was stolen from Dr. Paul.

I'm heading out to caucus in about a half hour. Does anyone know if CNN is covering the caucus or anything?

CNN's coverage, as far as I read, is supposed to go from 8pm-9pm Eastern.

As always, we will be in #atlasforum, which you can access by going to mibbit.com.

When are you starting the chat? Can't see it up yet.

Myself and another guy are already in here.

Will anyone be getting the results from this before CNN and all? (like what we did in Nevada on twitter)

I had a dream that Newt Gingrich won, complete with a legislative district map.

Do your political dreams tend to come true? In other words, should I start buying Gingrich stock on Intrade at this point? ;)

The WA GOP's result map says 0/195 reporting... 195 of what? I can't think of a logical way they get to that number for reporting data.

"Slight drama as someone fell off their chair and hit his head on a bench. A bunch of us ran over. He is fine. #wacaucus #ruggslake #ld44"

Thrilling.

Apparently someone sent out a robocall saying the caucuses were cancelled. No idea who it is/who was targeted.

I'm kind of tempted to go just because it's probably the only chance to see my precinct's result. But I wouldn't want to vote, just watch! :P

Before the WA-GOP "adjusts" the result, you mean?

Of course. Part of the adjustment is making detailed results unavailable. :(

So we're already out-shenaniganing the other caucuses. Before voting even starts. Take that, Nevada!

79.4% is what Romney currently has on Intrade. Don't you all find that incredibly overvalued considering it's a caucus and everything....with or without the last couple of polls?

He was higher in Colorado. Intrade is not reliable with caucuses. It never went for Santorum in Colorado/Iowa, Nevada was no contest though it got Minnesota and Maine fairly right.

Depends on whether they use the actual results or the official results. ;D

First precinct report on twitter has Paul 3, Santorum 3.

My precinct is 2 santorum 2 Paul 1 Gingrich. Lots of Paul and santorum presence. I have not seen any Romney support at all.

Is that the number of delegates or the actual people there?

Breaking: Paul and Santorum tied in Washington!

Paul: 5
Santorum: 5
Gingrich: 1

People. We haven't done delegates yet. We have two delegates so it'll probably 1-1 santorum and Paul.

Unofficial results of the combined caucus at the school I was at: 96 santorum, 89 Romney, 68 Paul, 36 Gingrich. Those are straw poll numbers. I am one of the two delegates for my precinct.

Is this Snohomish County or Cheney?

Snohomish county. Lakewood high school.

The results I'm seeing on Twitter look good for Romney.

Eastern Seattle suburbs "heavy for Romney"

Lakwood HS, Marysville: Santorum 96, Romney 89, Paul 68, Gingrich 36

Garfield City, Whitman County: Romney 24, Santorum 23, Gingrich 6, Paul 4

Reports from Tri-Cities of strong Romney support, little Santorum

Selah caucus in Yakima County split between Romney and Santorum

Mill Creek seems Romney/Paul split with some Gingrich and Santorum supporters

Damn, should have predicted a Romney win.

WASHINGTON.ROMNEY trading at 85.7

Mt. Vernon: Mitt Romney 6, Ron Paul 2, Newt Gingrich 1, Rick Santorum 1

Mount Vernon "good for Romney"

Various reports from Seattle saying Paul is winning

I've yet to see any areas reported as strong for Santorum

edit: The entire city of Mt. Vernon surely has more than 10 caucusers.  damn Twitter reports!

Ugh, yeah... That sounds like a Romney win. I always regret being brave and bold with my predictions.

David Irons says Romney got 60-70% in Sammamish.

"Bainbridge Island Delegates split Romney and RonPaul. Many for RickSantorum though. Straw poll results tonight"

Still yet to see a single report of a strong Santorum site, but plenty of strong Romney sites, and a few for Paul.

Sammamish (well-to-do Seattle 'burb) is "landslide for Romney"

Kirkland (ditto) "appeared evenly split between Mitt Romney, Ron Paul and Rick Santorum, although Newt Gingrich supporters were in attendance as well."

Belltown in Seattle: “This is pretty much a Ron Paul crowd,” he said. “Probably split between Ron Paul and Mitt Romney.”

SeaTac: "Paul supporters appear out in force, or at least have the most campaign apparel. Mitt Romney buttons dot a few coats. No sign of Santorum or Gingrich boosters."

Report of Romney win in suburban Everett

Bainbridge Island split between Romney and Paul, with many for Santorum too

Yeah, this looks over already. Hopefully I'm wrong. Losing 2 points in my own state, how embarrassing.

What are you following on Twitter to get results?

Redmond looking like another Romney win.

Spokane is supposedly good for Paul -- the Paul folks there allegedly have it together.

Otherwise, most of the Paul reports are coming from Seattle.

Caucus pics from the Seattle Times:

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Matt4RonPaul ‏ @MattWilliams06  Reply  Retweet  Favorite · Open
With #WA trying to make gold and silver coins legal tender in the state, the #WAcaucus should be all Ron Paul.

It appears from Twitter and news reports that far more people showed up than the WSRP was expecting. I suspect results will take quite a while.

As expected, Romney is getting blown out of the water in the Spokane metro area: Ron Paul 18, Rick Santorum 11, Mitt Romney 8 (Spokane Valley precinct)

"Across the cafeteria, precincts from Kent and Burien, with voters elbow to elbow around the cafeteria tables, favored Santorum. A precinct from Normandy Park went for Romney. A few other precincts liked Paul"

Redmond: Romney 133, Paul 109, Santorum 45, Gingrich 21, undecided 6, Colbert 1.

Who/what are y'all following?

Heritage HS (Vancouver): Paul at 200, Romney 188, santorum 147, 46 Gingrich, 15 undecided

Bremerton: Split between Romney and Paul, poor showing by Santorum

I'm increasingly thinking that Santorum may lose this to Ron Paul.

Maybe, but I don't think it will have a great impact on Tuesday.

Ah the "tax haven" vote comes in. :P  I assume the locals know why. :)

Don't you love caucuses?.....

http://blogs.mcclatchydc.com/washington/2012/03/party-officials-turned-at-least-1500-away-from-wash-caucus.html

They turned away a third of the voters?

The only alternative eh?  How about turning in the results late?  Yes, caucuses need to go, but the only problem is that in some states like Washington, the legislature and governor refuse to pay for another full dress election. So what does one do then?

This is going to be a big story if true. Why didn't the folks just shove their way in, or shut the entire caucus down or something?  I would not have stood for it myself.

Are the TV cameras all over the site right now, interviewing enraged turned away participants?

Good grief... why the hell would you do that?  You can always figure out a way to fit more people.

Brave and bold was how I won Iowa.  It's also how I lost Maine and Michigan (My HOME STATE!).

Uh Oh- The R3volution is going to flip out (as they should.)

Does anyone know what time official numbers will start coming out?

Overwhelming turn out for...Mitt Romney? I guess there really is a first for everything.

They tweeted "around 5 PM" two hours ago.  But I'm not sure if they mean 5 PM EST or PST...

He was the only one at my location without a single sign or anything. I saw no organization whatsoever for Romney and he got booed a ton when they were going through the question phase, yet somehow he got a narrow second at my location.

Santorum had by far the most signs, while Paul had by far the most "coordinators".

PST. It is a PST state. :)

The world revolves around the East Coast, of course. :D

Are they going to announce it all at once, like Maine?

5pm PT / 8pm ET

I'm only hoping Romney wins because I predicted he'd pull this off.

You don't mean...

Correct.  They just tweeted me back!

If Santorum doesn't win, I'd much rather Paul did than Romney.

Fingers crossed that Paul or Santorum win Benton County and then lose statewide by <1000 votes. Chaos chaos chaos!

This is going to be a bigger disaster than Maine!

Lord, Romney is getting slaughtered in Spokane:

"WA 3rd Legislative District Straw Poll results:With 21out of 22 Precincts reporting:Ron Paul 122, Santorum 52, Rom 44, & Newt 26."

Wait, is it possible that Paul wins this? Or are we just looking at a strong second over Santorum?

If Paul wins, I'll even be more pissed.  I thought about predicting him, but after Maine, decided not too.  If he actually wins Washington, I'll have lost all hope in my predicting talent. ;)

Random Whitman County precincts: 75 Paul, 29 Santorum, 27 Romney, 12 Gingrich, 15 Uncom.

From somewhere in Whitman County, allegedly.  Too many votes to be a precinct; my guess is it's the Pullman caucus site.  I like "Willard"

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Romney leads Paul 90-8 on Intrade.

hahaha Willard

I defer to the judgment of those who know the state better than I do.

But I would note that there's sure to be a selection effect in this Twitter reporting, in that Paul voters are more likely to tweet their results out than the supporters of other candidates, and they are (by definition) more likely to live in areas with strong Paul support.

Santorum should be praying that he's running strong in counties where no one has internet access.  ;)

I don't think Paul is doing well enough in the suburbs to win, but even with his Twitter overrepresentation, I'm pretty sure at this point that he's leading Santorum.

If Paul wins, should I be happy we get 4 people on the map or sad that I don't get 2 points?

IIRC, "Uncommitted" won a couple of counties in 2008.  Would be funny if that happened again.

And like Morden said - the Paul voters are more likely to show good results.  It's safe to assume this is a Paul supporter uploading results.

That was my thought before Maine (although I'd have gotten the points)... it hasn't happened with the GOP since 1968, I believe.

Yep Inks, I agree.  We also had one caucus site in rural Whitman County that Romney narrowly won over Santorum.  If that were Pullman's caucus results, that wouldn't be an especially amazing performance for Paul; it's a university town.


I haven't seen Uncommitted totals reported much so far, although that might explain the cryptic "Yacl" on the right end of the Whitman County paper.

Adding together all the explicit results mentioned so far:

Paul 580 (35.0%)
Romney 511 (30.6%)
Santorum 393 (23.5%)
Gingrich 148 (8.8%)
Uncom 36 (2.2%)
Other 1

It's "Und" for Undecided.

Twitter feed is now filling up with Ron Paul stolen election complaints.

'Twas inevitable.

It's time for a new prescription, Alcon... ;)

Well, when you turn away 1000 people, you're gonna piss a lot of people off.  Though from a statistical standpoint, the distribution of the 1000 would hypothetically be the same as for the 2000 people that got in... hypothetically.

Apparently, the Bellevue-based 41st had a total turnout of 130.  These turnout reports don't quite gel...

I haven't seen any evidence that the turning 1000 people away hurt Paul any more than anyone else. I doubt Paul wins in Kennewick anyway.

Not if supporters of some candidates were more likely to show up early or shove their way to the front than supporters of others.

What is that - a precinct?  Is that high or low?

The die-hard Paul supporters would get there early.  The college kid Paul supporters would show up late.

Again, I said hypothetically.  But I really don't think it has a huge impact on the result.

Fox is reporting high turnout, but no percentages.  Romney?

Nate Silver seemed to think high turnout would help Santorum or possibly Paul.

It's a legislative district, 1/49th of the state population.  That's about the same turnout as the Whitman County piece of paper, which may not have covered the county, which is only 1/175th of the state's population total.

And then Benton County allegedly turned away 10x that many people, even though it's only a little more populous than a legislative district...

Doesn't make sense.

It doesn't seem to be helping Santorum.

This is the biggest circus of the primary season so far.

The Washington State GOP hasn't even got started, my friend.

First results "expected at 3:30".

We're getting reports of delegates from some areas, and actual voters from others. I'm guessing that explains much of the discrepancy.

That was a problem last time too.

If the 41st LD total was delegates and not turnout, that makes some sense...but Benton County turnout (or turn-away) has to be way overestimated.

Where did you hear that?

Random other results

Ridgefield (Clark County): 107 Santorum, 106 Romney, 83 Paul, 42 Gingrich, 10 Undecided
Sedro-Wooley (Skagit) - partial: 31 Santorum, 27 Romney, 20 Paul, 10 Gingrich, 6 Undecided

The twitterverse. No guarantees, I suppose.

WSRP's twitter said 5:00.

Official Yakima County results?

Romney 394
Santorum 252
Paul 225
Gingrich 136

Skagit County

Romney 393
Santorum 202
Paul 170
Gingrich 162

No idea if these are accurate or not.

These look fairly legit.  Romneyslide.

Do we have a feature on the site where you can do county map generation, or do you still have to do it with Paint/some other image editor?

Romney won Yakima last time. Not surprising he won it again.

Paint, unfortunately.

Where are you getting county results for the 2008 caucus? Atlas doesn't have them.

I have a spreadsheet with them, plus they're on the map in my primary megathread.

Here's my map from 2008, for reference:

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Uncommitted won Pacific, I believe.

^ It's possible some of the numbers are out of date... Do you have a source?

Besides Pacific being Uncommitted, Wikipedia also has Klickitat County as light blue, which doesn't correspond to any code...other than that, things look consistent.

This CNN link is ok, but it omits Romney's votes for some reason:

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/results/state/#val=WA (http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/results/state/#val=WA)

Pretty sure Klickitat was Paul country.

Okay, I've updated Pacific and Klickitat's percentage.

Tally from this thread so far:

Romney 1,398 (35.41%)
Paul 1,056 (26.75%)
Santorum 953 (24.14%)
Gingrich 487 (12.34%)

No idea how legit this is, but:

"With vote counted from 15 small counties, Romney is leading #wacaucus with 31.5%. Paul at 26.9%, Santorum 24.4% and Gingrinch 12.9%"

It's looking like Romney, with a very weak Santorum showing.

He's a reporter for the Seattle Times, so...

Huffington Post is comparing today's caucus results to 2008's primary results.  ::)

hese initial results probably represent only 10% or less of the #wacaucus vote, WA GOP Chairman Kirby Wilbur says

Kirby WIlbur (@uw '81), the @WAGOP Chairman, is about to release initial #WAcaucus straw poll results. #uwelectioneye

These early counties are overwhelmingly Eastern Washington, which means Paul is probably solid for 2nd and Romney is almost certainly the winner.

Depends on which counties exactly, but this is probably true.

Hearing that @MittRomney won in Cowlitz County... #wacaucus

One of Santorum's better opportunities gone, if true.

Is any network covering this. I'm seeing no online coverage or maps besides Huffington which has nothing in.

Romney won last time there too.

I was surprised when I saw the PPP polling with Santorum doing so well. My model had WA in the Romney column 6 months ago.

Any idea why the polls were so far out? These results show WA as pretty close to ME which is what you would expect.

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First results:

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CNN coverage will start at 8pm Eastern.


I don't suppose anyone wants to volunteer to make a map of these results?  ;)

Is Santorum really going to come in third place?

"Undecided"

Do they mean uncommitted?

Politico is reporting here:

http://www.politico.com/2012-election/map/#/President/2012/Primary/WA

Starting the Atlas-style map:

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AP is reporting that Klickitat is Paul 81, Gingrich 61 (?!), Romney 58, Santorum 53

CNN posting results now:

http://edition.cnn.com/election/2012/primaries/state/wa

IIRC some of the caucuses voted early.

CNN:
8% in
Romney: 31%
Paul: 27%
Santorum: 24%
Gingrich: 14%

Reports that Romney wins Clark County 37%-28% - blow to Paul's (low) chances

:D

Would you mind explaining the colors again bgwah?  Green is Mittens, Yellow is Paul, I assume, but what are the other two colors?

Who thought he could win this?

Cautious :)

It shouldn't be a major  influence on Super Tuesday.

Pretty sure they were all held today.  That part of Washington is a weird place so I'm not stunned.

G=Gingrich
R=Romney
P=Paul
S=Santorum

I thought Washington was in the bag for Santorum, and now he might end up in third place? Somebody even started a poll asking if Santorum's win in Washington would blunt Romney's momentum after Michigan/Arizona...

Santorum. They look like different colors because one is shaded very weak and one is very strong. Seen enough.

Calling WA for Romney. Congrats Romney.

WA's been in my safe Romney column for quite some time now. I was surprised by PPP's calls for Santorum. Didn't seem to square with his support in general.

Thanks.

Not looking good for Santorum.  I think I blew this one pretty badly.

Is there anybody giving good results other than CNN?

Google, as always.

http://www.google.com/elections/ed/us/results/2012/gop-primary/wa

The way these caucuses have been run I expect Putin to win

I often find Google to be behind CNN.

I'm amused that the three small counties in the SE corner have gone for three different candidates.

Yes.  Santorum, Romney, Paul, going from west to east.

Considering that second place went to three different people as well.

Big new dump is great for Romney, and good for Santorum.  Strong Romney wins in Thurston, Clark, Benton and Kitsap, with Paul struggling.

Santorum may take 2nd here.

Paul nearly wins San Juan.

updated

From Google's latest results:

Romney 36%
Paul 25%
Santorum 25%
Gingrich 12%

Paul and Santorum exactly tied at 4203 votes.

Beat me too it, but because of the graphic I snapped ...

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Doesn't this suggest that Mittens will break 40% when it is all over?  Say 42% as a wild guess?

The % reporting is probably inaccurate. King County has small precincts (and a lot less Republicans), distorting the number a bit.

Not sure how that dump is good news for Santorum.

Looks good for Romney.  Looks good for Santorum to at least finish in 2nd too though.

We are at 31% of precincts reporting, and like bgwah says, King County has unusually small precincts with low numbers of Republicans (although, conversely, Pierce has big precincts.)

More at about 6 PM PT, sayeth GOP

All the big Santorum counties still out - but so is King. Even if Santorum gets some solid results, it's not going to be enough to overtake.

It is starting to look grim for Santorum.

What are the odds that Paul and Santorum would get exactly 4,203 each with 22% reported?

WA is crazy.

Santorum - 51 percent

Romney - 58 percent

Ron Paul - 52 percent

Santorum is in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.
Paul is in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th.
Romney is in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 2 percent out of 4th in Klickitat.
Gingrich is in 2nd,3rd, and 4th.

The only thing left is a county where Gingrich is in 1st, and Romney is in 4th.

Google has Kitsap at 100.5% reporting (186/185 precincts). ???

EDIT: Never mind; it's fixed.

Given an effective range of 5 percent? About 1/4k or so, for the exact match.

CNN's election coverage intro is more epic than a Tim Pawlenty campaign ad.  What are they going to do for Super Tuesday?

I might be late to the party, but how is turnout looking compared to 2008.

Big. Up 30 percent.

Does each precinct select delegates to the state convention? Does each precinct have one delegate, or how are they selected? Is it first by the post in each precinct, or proportional, or what?  I read Green Papers, and these are the questions I had.

Are delegates to the national convention chosen proportionately based on the vote in the state convention?

I think these are delegates to a state convention that then chooses delegates to the RNC.

Yes, but I am more interested in the interim steps as outlined above.

Benton County(Where I'm from) proves it's country club Republican status once again.

I'm not from WA, but why on earth is the state so polarized?

King in, 52% Romney.  Strong Romney win in Pierce, too.

Paul now narrowly leads Santorum; he beat Santorum narrowly in both Pierce and King.

The results today are from the non-binding straw poll, just like in Iowa and Nevada. There is a delegate selection process (which starts in the precincts and ends on the state level in a proportional to population fashion) that also started today. Paul could get some "ninja delegates" through this process like people say he may in other states as well.

If you believe the report, it's only a quarter of King.

I don't see Santorum making a comeback.  It'd even be a really far longshot for Paul.  I'm guessing the networks will be calling it soon.

They should call it now.  This is a small bloodbath.

If King and Pierce are in and Santorum is tied with Paul, he should have no problem getting there.

Kitsap was 2-1 Santorum over Paul. All the Santorum strong counties are all that's left out there, with King in.

Thanks, but how does each precinct elect folks to go to the state convention?  What is the exact process?  Pity no WA Atlasians are Pubs, who would be actually doing it. :(

True, surprised they haven't already.  Turnout is really high. All the Romney areas are in but Santorum's areas are all outstanding. This is frontloaded Romney at his best.

Oh, Paul's not going to finish second - all his areas are in and Santorum is beating him in King + Pearce.  

It's over.

I'm not seeing why the remaining counties are clearly Santorum > Paul.  All of them seem fairly ambiguous besides likely Paul counties (Spokane, Stevens.)  While Kitsap was 2-to-1 Santorum over Paul, Paul beat Santorum in the more working-class Pierce County.  Weird distribution of votes all-around...

Fortunately, for Santorum, it won't make too much of a difference for Super Tuesday.

It is a very good night for Mittens.

Congratulations Politico!

"The King County districts that are in: 1st, 31st, 47th and 48th"

That means that the reports are a mix of suburbs and exurbs, with no Seattle.

Kudos to the GOP WA state chairman.  I'm watching him reporting the next slug of votes. He is precise and articulate and informative. We have finally found a competent GOP party official during this primary season. It's just fabulous. :)

It's bisected north-to-south by a mountain range. West of the Cascades things are (simplifying a bit) liberal West Coast-y and a lot like Northern California and coastal Oregon, politically; to the east things are (again, simplifying a bit) more like Idaho.

The only areas that have gone solidly Paul are sparsely populated areas. Spokane is a large rural city. Even in Seattle and the environs - also heavy Paul areas. he's not getting any margin vs Santorum. He's up, by what 1 vote in King? He's not going to win vs Santorum unless he beats Santorum in heavily populated areas.  

All the areas outstanding voted Bush in Bush vs Gore, and are fairly heavily populated areas, matching up with Kitsap.

Look at the county by county results. Some of Romney's highest support is on the other side of the mountains, and some of Santorum's highest support is in bordering counties. If you look at 2008 results, it's positively schizophrenic.

Nowhere have we seen 3 candidates getting 50+ percent in a county and finishing last in another different county.

If the mountain effect were at work, we'd expect to see what we saw in Michigan - heavily Romney on the coast, heavy Santorum in the interior.

Fixed.

:(

The Paul people's organization in Spokane is fantastic, and early anecdotal reports from the 3rd LD saw him beating the pants out of Romney there; plus I think he was leading a report out of Spokane Valley.  Paul is beating Santorum in all of the urbanized counties but Kitsap: King, Clark, Pierce, Snohomish, Thurston.

The counties remaining:

Snohomish - A bit like Pierce and Kitsap, although that obviously doesn't help us much.

Whatcom - Has some Dutch calvinists, but also has a university town.

Skagit - Early report had Santorum leading Paul 202-170.

Chelan - Hard to say, but enough Western Washington transplants that I doubt it will be solid Santorum.

Douglas - Probably good for Santorum, but low-population enough to get a weird result.

Grant - Probably Santorum.

Stevens - Almost certainly Paul.

Spokane - I think Paul, you think Santorum, we'll see.

Overall, hardly looks like a slam-dunk for Santorum, and King County has plenty left to go (including all of Seattle.)

Romney declared by CNN.  Double digits with Paul in second.

CNN on Snohomish County: Strong Romney win, good Paul showing

Also, forgot to mention that Island County is out too.  Seems like another place where a Santorum run-away seems unlikely (Kitsap results notwithstanding)

Congratulation Politico and Winfield.  :P

I'm actually beginning to think that Obama is better off running against Romney... All Romney can accomplish is marginally beating flawed, unlikeable candidates by outspending them 5-1. Santorum, and even Gingrich at least had some appeal to the GOP base... Romney is pretty much vanilla yogurt.

Didn't Paul beat Rick by 100-200 votes or something in Snohmish?  In fact, unless I misheard, Paul won the county, but I suspect I may have.

I called it at 8 percent. :D

So far I've not missed a state.

I'm not watching CNN; I got that from Twitter.  I haven't seen any official results come up yet.

Jon Ralston ‏ @RalstonFlash  Reply  Retweet  Favorite · Open
Ron Paul tonight will quadruple the number of states he has won. (4 times 0 = 0) #WAcaucus

Yes, I was listening to the GOP chairman read the numbers orally, but didn't focus enough on the Mittens number. I thought it was just slightly below Paul's by a few votes. Something like 1060 Paul, 1040 Mitt, 920 Rick. I know Rick was in the 900's and Paul between 1000-1100.

America's favorite tag team :)

Santorum's beaten Paul in every moderately sized county, on both sides of the mountain. None of the counties outstanding fit the profile of the counties that Paul has beaten Santorum.

Eric Earling, who's a major GOPer in Snohomish County, reports it was a solid Romney win with Paul narrowly beating Santorum.  Makes more sense to me than a Paul win there, but nothing official from the state GOP yet.

Snohomish: Romney 42%, Paul 25%, Santorum 22%

Congradulations Mitt Romney!

Yep. Congrats Politico.

People asked me how it was possible for Mitt to win the nomination with less that 40 percent? Example A - Washington.

Congrats Phil Politico!

No idea what you're talking about.

Paul > Santorum
Asotin
Clark
Ferry
Grays Harbor
Jefferson
Klickitat
Okanogan
Pacific
Pend Oreille
Snohomish
Thurston
Wahkiakum

Paul roughly = Santorum
Clallam
Cowlitz
King (so far)
Lewis
Lincoln
Pierce (so far)
San Juan
Whitman
Yakima

Santorum > Paul
Adams
Benton
Columbia
Franklin
Garfield
Kitsap
Kittitas
Mason
Skagit (unofficial)
Walla Walla

No report
Chelan
Douglas
Island
King (part)
Pierce (part)
Skagit (official)
Spokane
Stevens
Whatcom

Mittens must have been 1400 or something rather than 1040. I transposed the digit 4, sort of. :)

Conspiracy!

Conspiracy? Btw what is your favorite Star Wars movie Kenobi?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-6sGmI7ciA

ANH.

I'm very much an Alec Guinness Kenobi, and not a Liam Neeson Kenobi.

Politico wins the Internets.

That is *exactly* how I picture you two.

Spokane. 

All we have are unofficial stuff on Spokane. Plus I'm questioning whether Spokane is Paul territory to.

Whatcom for Santorum. lol Lynden.

About as I expected, the rest of the Puget Sound was a bit of a Paul-Santorum wash.  Stevens County was about a tie (terrible for Mitt.)  I expect Santorum to beat Paul by enough in Skagit to bring them back to around a tie.  Unless I'm wrong about Spokane County, it's up to remaining King and Pierce (plus possible small contributions from the Wenatchee area) if Santorum wants to overtake Paul.  I'd give it less than 50/50 odds.

Liam was Qui-Gon, silly. 

And there we go Whatcom.

What was I saying again?

Really? Shows you how often I've seen the prequels.

Ah, the other Scottish dude. Ewan McGregor.

ARGH!!!!!!!!

I knew I should've gone with Romney!  Damnit!

Liberty, Equality...Paternity?

Ohhh, I thought you were talking about general left-right polarization.

Yeah, about these caucus results, I got nothing, except that the caucus is probably somehow questionable in how it's run.

Out of curiosity, is it possible to make a guess as to how strong Mormon turnout was, by looking at turnout in individual counties?  Which counties have the highest %age of Mormons?

Yeah, oh well. I'll just stick the polls from now on. :(

You were saying that the remaining areas were clearly Santorum>Paul, and that Santorum had beaten Paul in every "moderately sized" county, neither of which were true.

Because of Lynden, no one here is surprised that Santorum beat Paul (and by just 5 points) in Whatcom.  Unless you think Spokane will be heavily Santorum, or Santorum will just slaughter in the Wenatchee area, I'm not sure why you were so certain that Santorum would win the remaining areas by enough to overtake Paul.  You were certainly wrong about Snohomish.

Santorum overtakes Paul in Pierce County based on new votes, leaving Paul only 12 votes ahead.  Pierce up to 31% reporting.

With unofficial Skagit results, Santorum leads.  No news out of Spokane or the other chunk of King.

I'm hearing Spokane turnout numbers (about 5K) but no results.

Indeed. I was wrong about Snohomish. I didn't expect Snohomish to break for Paul over Santorum. However, Santorum has just equalized. So unless the votes outstanding break for Paul, I don't think Paul can win this.

Actually, looks like Spokane was about a three-way tie, no Paulslide, according to Twitter:

Romney 1,521
Santorum 1,511
Paul 1,340
Gingrich 411
Uncommitted 273

Paul may be in trouble for 2nd.

Liam is Irish! hahaha what kind of star wars fan are you?

I haven't even seen the Prequels other than the last one.

For me there are 4 star wars videos. :D

I did that and it screwed me out of Colorado though, and Santorum did better than the polls in Iowa, so I was confident in the add 7% or so to Santorum's poll numbers and you'll be safe method, but apparently that's not so good afte all. :P

I have to say that the Newt bounce tonight is exceptional.

You can still use polls to determine who has the momentum. Santorum had the momentum going into Iowa, hence my >20% Santorum prediction. Polling showed us momentum was going to Romney hard in WA and I ignored it.

I'm going to go cry myself to sleep now.






Not really.

What's the deal with Adams County?  Why is it so heavily Romney, and what are its demographics like in general?  I thought maybe Mormons, but (according to Wikipedia) English ancestry is only 5.6% and there are even a few people who speak German as their first language.  So now I'm even more confused.

OK, trying to answer my own question on Mormons.....

This map:

link (http://www.slate.com/articles/life/map_of_the_week/2012/02/mormon_population_in_the_u_s_an_interactive_map.html)

claims to show the %age of people in (nearly) each county in the USA who are Mormon.  Not a perfect correlation, but those southeastern counties where Romney is winning big seem to be the most Mormon.  The most Mormon county in the state is Adams, and Romney has a whopping 58% of the vote there (which I think might be his highest %age in the state).  So I presume that explains the divide between northeastern and southeastern Washington.

The map I linked to above says that Adams is 13% Mormon, which is the highest %age in the state.  Assuming that's accurate of course....

And that also answers my question too. Interesting.

Sorry for answering sooner, but yes, that's largely correct.

Another big boost for Romney in that area stems from the fact that much of it is majority Hispanic. Adams County is 59% Hispanic, much of it recently established (still mostly immigrants and/or under 18). So 13% Mormon is probably something like 1/4th or 1/3rd of the voting eligible population. And then of course an even higher proportion of Republicans, and even higher proportion of people who would bother to go to a caucus.

Man I wanna know if I'm right about Paul vs Santorum!

Actually, a number of the early Mormons were of German extraction (including a few distant relatives).

That is true... although Colorado is still unexplained.  Plus, I thought PPP's Romney momentum was overstated in WA, due to what I considered was too high of Mormon numbers and I thought the momentum from AZ/MI wouldn't play as much of a factor today as it did in PPP's poll.

Skagit and Spokane added in (reports wre legit), plus some more Pierce.  In all cases, Santorum led by Paul by a bit and has taken the lead.  Santorum +226.

All of Chelan and Douglas are outstanding, plus parts of King (75%) and Pierce (57%).

Paul has a few hundred to make up in the remaining King, Pierce and Wenatcheeland totals.

Gah, I hope the race doesn't get dull as dirt from here on with Romney winning everything.

Douglas County: Santorum 121, Romney 87, Paul 67, Gingrich 66.

Santorum +280.

Edit, CNN has the reverse, Paul up by 250 with not Skagit, Chelan, Douglas or Spokane.

Just missing part of King and Pierce (dotted counties) and all of Chelan and Douglas now:

()

Still TCTC with King tipping for Paul.

See, this is exactly what I was saying. If Paul is going to win, he had to beat Santorum in King, not in the rest of the state. King will be the difference maker for him.

Santorum lost Spokane by 10 measly votes.

Paul is up 250 because King reported another 25% and Paul now leads Santorum 27%-18% there.

And, no, you said something about all moderately-sized counties being Santorum>Paul :P

They were tied 19-all.

That's why I said that Santorum could not lose so long as he split King with Paul.

Really close to calling this with 50 percent of King out, for Paul.

Aren't the odds of Paul coming in second close to about 90% now?  Chalin is an empty county no?  What Pierce has left given the totals of what it had with 43% in, is anemic compared to King, with 50% out.

Well, 50 percent in, variance down to about 2 percent or so, double that would put Paul up by about half a percent.

That, given outstanding Pierce, swinging with Santorum, and with the only county outstanding...

Santorum might pick up another 250 votes, from Pierce and the county left.

Santorum will have to improve in Pierce to overcome the margin, but he wouldn't need much, and he'd need King to split.

If it were 400, it would be a call. 250, still TCTC.

With the odds of Rick doing that being about the same as a successful Hail Mary pass.

Updated map: ()

Chelan should be about 1.5% of the state vote, although it's hard to know how it will go.  You could make a good case for Romney, Santorum and even Paul.

This is all about Pierce and King.  The last King dump may have been Seattle, by the way, so we may only have the working-class Seattle suburbs left, plus Pierce County.  Hard to say though.

I don't want it to be dull, I want it to be over. :)

It has a population of 66,000.

I'm just hoping this is Nevada 2.0, with Romney supporters deciding he's won the nomination and not bothering to show up for the contests a few days later.

Frankly, now more than ever, am I having a hard time understanding how Santorum won Colorado.

Yeah, Colorado looks downright bizarre in retrospect.

That's double Douglas. That's good news for Santorum. Add another 100 votes swing and he only needs to get within 3 of Paul in King, assuming that Peirce doesn't swing some more his way too.

Thank you very much, and might I say..........Congratulations Politico

as Winfield and Politico give each other a cyber high five.  :D

This is a great night for Washington, this is a great night for America, and this is a great night for democracy, not to mention a great night for Mitt.

Would that would be so, however, that is not to going to happen.  Romney will win, but he will absolutely not win everything from here on in, unfortunately.

Chelan is a tougher county demographically, though.  Douglas has East Wenatchee and then a sprawling farmland dotted by small towns.  Part of Chelan County (Wenatchee to Cashmere) is similar to Douglas County, although more urbanized, but other parts (Leavenworth, Lake Chelan) have a lot more Western Washington influence.

I think Santorum will probably beat Paul there (hell, he creamed him in Kittitas County, a college county) but I'd guess Romney will win Chelan.

That is, if they don't follow WAGOP tradition and stop counting for no reason.

Well, it's always interesting to learn more about all the little parts of America that get very little coverage.

I've been to some of these places, but not eastern Washington or Spokane. Just on the pacific side of I-5

It looks like Romney by 11 points.

With Gingrich as irrelevant.

More, if anything.  Romney is outperforming his state average in both King and Pierce (+9% and +5%, respectively).  Based on a simplistic extrapolation, the remaining vote probably splits about 57% King, 35% Pierce and 8% Chelan.

Strong night for Romney, even if he's likely to barely beat his Colorado showing.

If this is the precursor to Super Tuesday, the race could well be effectively over.

CNN has 83% of precincts reporting.  Only 4% left before it's time to stop counting......

;)

Reports from Vantage, Washington, of about 5,000 pieces of paper reading "Ron Paul" floating down the Columbia River.

Of course.  Everytime someone loses to Romney there's always thousands of votes for another candidate floating down a river, eaten by a dog, or transported telepathically into outer space.

(sigh)

Washington - 3.77% Mormon
Colorado -  2.69% Mormon

Add to that the fact that the Seattle suburbs contain GOP voters who should be very friendly to Romney (i.e. not religious) and a lot of Colorado's wealthy heavily Republican areas are fundy hotbeds (see, e.g. Colorado Springs), and you have a lot of the answers.

You may mock, but the Maine GOP chairman out-and-out said that they threw out every ballot paper:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/17/maine-gop-chair-romney-will-maintain-win/

Brian M. Rosenthal ‏ @brianmrosenthal  Reply  Retweet  Favorite · Open
Chelan County finally in. The only #wacaucus votes missing are 8 leg districts in King and 1 in Pierce - the one Paul visited this morning

Not able to find Chelan results yet.

Chelan:

Romney 209
Santorum 194
Paul 181
Gingrich 99
Uncommitted 44
Other 1

Told you that you could make a good case for Romney, Santorum or Paul winning Chelan :P

AP doesn't have it yet.

I'm not so sure why people are so surprised.

Look at the pre-Colorado predictions. Like I said at the start - my chart had WA as strong Romney. I was shocked with the predictions that Santorum could take WA - just because of the demographics.

Like it was said earlier - WA is a coastal state in the west. Mitt is very strong in the west (+Mitt), strong in Obama states (WA isn't purple), and weak in midwest states, southern states and Red states.

WA is not a hard Romney call right from the beginning. I'm still struggling to understand the PPP polls with Santorum up by double digits in WA.

So, tonight is a victory for sanity if that means anything at all. It means that our essential analysis of the situation is correct, and should prevail on super tuesday. OH will determine the nomination.

A win in OH for Santorum over Romney means that he should get the nomination. A win by Romney means that he should get the nomination, as he'll have enough support with IL + OH, despite losing in MI with the delegate split.

More Pierce in, up to 80% reporting.  Not a great LD for Romney; I think Paul and Santorum did fairly well in Puyallupland, which is where Twitter alleges the remaining LD was.  (Although there's clearly more missing.)

Paul now leads by 189 with the vast majority of outstanding votes from King County.

It does as of 3-5 minutes ago.

Then Santorum stands in third, and he's still not showing well out west.

80% of Pierce is in.  Paul is still leading Santorum by 0.6 points.  Romney is leading Paul by 11.

Almost there!

()

I call at double variance and variance is at about .5 percent. Paul leads Santorum by .445 points, so even with calling at variance it's still TCTC.

izabels ‏ @izabels  Reply  Retweet  Favorite · Open
#RonPaul winWA the msmCNnFOXMSNBC not cover of #WACAUCUS lol #PresidentPaul #gop #tcot #Pe #tpot #ohprimary #akcaucus #idcaucus #vtprimary

Isn't it a little suspicious that the GOP is able to release the King County results in exactly 25% margins?

Pierce now 100% reported, and the last results were good enough for Santorum that he now trails Paul by just 178 votes statewide.

All remaining votes are now in King County, where there have been two dumps: one a modest win for Paul over Santorum, and one a Paulslide.


They tallied results by LD, so my guess is they didn't have the number of precincts per LD handy, so they reported to AP "we have 4/16 LDs counted" (25%), and the AP set it to whatever number of precincts would equal 25%.

No.

The first one was 19-19 for Paul/Santorum so it a draw. Still two dumps left.

Since it would be unseemly to wait until after all the results are in, I'm calling it for Paul.

If it holds, Santorum drops and Romney increases.

The good news for Santorum is that this is a Saturday, with other news and it probably will have limited effect on Super Tuesday.

The bad news is, it is probably reflective of momentum.

What about all those Rahn Pahl votes in floating in the Columbia river?

I'm not quite ready to call it for Paul.

The first King County LDs dumped were the 1st, 31st, 47th and 48th.  The 1st and 48th are suburban districts.  The 47th is suburban and exurban.  The 31st is exurban, rural and small.

The next dump that was solidly for Paul.  We don't know which four LDs it was.  However, if Paul and Santorum were tied in an overwhelmingly suburban and exurban sample, it would be reasonable to guess that the second dump was Seattle-heavy.

If that is so, the remaining areas to report are probably in Southeastern King County, the most working-class area.  Demographically, it seems like it would be Santorum's best area of the county.  I just doubt it was heavily represented in the second dump, because it's hard to imagine it being strongly Paul over Santorum.

Of course, this is sketchy data to work with, but I'd say you can make a reasonable argument that Santorum is likelier to prevail.

The numbers in King just jumped but the percentage in didn't...

Well I guess that settles that!

To put it in perspective.

Romney's been holding serve. MI was a loss as he was choked out of any delegate advantage.

WA was another Romney state that was up for grabs that he successfully defended. Super Tuesday is his first opportunity to do some damage to the conservatives on their home front.

Winning states you are supposed to win isn't really indicative of much - especially with his weak showing here, compared with AZ.

Had this been an AZ style blowout, sure. But he still only got 36 percent in WA. That's - really not a good showing for Romney. He's still very vulnerable, and if what we are seeing is any indication - still having trouble selling himself to voters.

So it's all going to come down to Super Tuesday where the South finally gets another chance to have a say, something it hasn't had since South Carolina.

I may be crazy, but I think more King County just came in?  It's now Paul by 303, and the King County margin between Paul and Santorum looks roughly unchanged.  If there were new votes, it didn't look like 25% of the county's worth, though.

Perhaps there's nothing new and I'm going crazy.

Alcon explained perfectly.

Romney went from 15,980 to 17,000 to there were definitely some new votes added in.

FWIW it looks like Romney will win the straw vote in 9 of the 10 Congressional Districts. Santorum won the the other one (5th CD).

Heh, so Santorum gets him some delegates? That's good news. 5 delegates?

Uh, no.  If Santorum wins Ohio that does not mean he wins the nomination.  Regardless of whether it's Romney or Santorum, Ohio will very likely be close, and the delegates awarded will, consequently, be close.  This is a game of delegate numbers.  

Romney is in much better position than Santorum is in for the long haul.  

Given the states, and the delegate counts - Santorum needs Ohio. Romney wins if he can pick up IL plus one other rust belt state. MI was a push, so that doesn't help him.

Santorum should be able to hold on if he can win in Ohio. Ohio is the toughest rust belt state for him to win, which is why he's actually in decent shape so far. But he needs OH, TN + OK on tuesday.

Newt needs GA.

King is now listed as 75% in and Paul leads by 271, so Santorum actually beat him in the last batch.  My Southeast County hypothesis may have been spot-on, but at this rate it wouldn't be enough.

Is the WA GOP going to release the results by LD at some point?

Just plain ol' variance at this point. Congrats to the Paul folks. :)

I'm not sure about LD results, but it seems reasonable, considering that the big counties are reporting by LD.

In other news, Southeast King County must have been in the last dumps (where Santorum led) because the remaining LDs are all affluent Seattle suburbs and Seattle's most liberal, urban district.  Expect Romney to do very well in the final batch, and Santorum to do poorly.  I'm ready to call this for Paul in 2nd.


edit: Full disclosure that the 32rd and 45th have some more working-class voters in Shoreline and rural-ish areas, respectively, but the 41st is probably Washington's richest LD.  The 43rd has a puny Republican population, and may go for Paul; McCain didn't break 10%.  None of these areas seem like they'd be rich in Santorum votes.

I forget if this has been confirmed --- are they using old or new districts?

I don't know how they'd use new districts, since the precincts aren't finished in virtually any county...so probably old, unless they split up precincts between LDs and allocated delegates somehow.  Sounds like a nightmare to me.

Although actually, I think that's exactly what the Democrats are doing, and I think it's a terrible idea.

97% reporting

King now 81% in, Paul back up to +323.

Romney 17,922
Paul 11,998
Santorum 11,675
Gingrich 5,066

99% reporting

King now 88% in, Paul down slightly to +313.  Great for Romney; may have been a suburban district.

Romney 18,771 (+849)
Paul 12,248 (+250)
Santorum 11,935 (+260)
Gingrich 5,175 (+109)

Colorado was before he so publicly and (to many people) repulsively explained his intent to govern as a outdated theocrat.

Well, Romney's pal Ron Paul managed to get 2nd place. Could this primary be over after Tuesday?

I'm not sure how WA does it, but we used new districts in Michigan.  I'm not sure if thats an MIGOP thing or an RNC thing though.

100% reporting; Paul jumps up to a 505-vote lead in the unofficial final results.

Romney 19,111 (+340)
Paul 12,594 (+346)
Santorum 12,089 (+154)
Gingrich 5,221 (+46)

I guess that may be the 46th LD there (must be lonely to be a Santorum supporter in Seattle, but maybe some people were playing with the process.)

Romney 38%
Paul 25%
Santorum 24%
Gingrich 10%

Turnout was quite bad it seems.

Only 50.000 voting in a state that was more than double the population of Iowa.

And Iowa had at least 130.000 people voting ...

I thought about 200.000 would vote in WA, without the primary and everything.

Isn't the turnout here comparable to a CO or a MN?  Iowa always has higher turnout than other caucus states.  It's kind of unreasonable to expect otherwise, since Iowa gets about a year of heavy attention from the candidates and media in advance of the voting.

Does anyone remember what turnout was in the 2008 Democratic caucus? The official numbers we have on Atlas are delegate totals, not turnout.

This may be an underestimation, but the Washington Democratic Party's database lists 187,003 people as being credited with voting in the 2008 caucuses.

Also, congratulations to the WA GOP on a freakishly accurate turnout estimate.  They predicted 50,000 people and 50,764 people voted.

Final map:

()

So I am guessing they dumped about 5,000 Ron Paul votes into Columbia.

Over a million easily.

OVER 9000

I was gonna say that... then thought it was too overused.  Now I regret not saying it first. ;)

Holy crap.

I'm okay with this result. It means I get more points for my predictions.

Ugh :(

Newt is empowering Romney. If he doesn't drop out soon it's over.

Fox reported Paul was running anti-Romney commercials.


Yes, there was a lot of freakishly accurate stuff in WA.

Santorum would have lost with 100% of the Gingrich vote.

I know but Romney is going to have an easier time if they keep splitting the vote among the two of them.

It's been blindingly obvious to everyone other than Newt's team it seems.

I think Newt is still convinced it's Santorum's fault for staying in.  He seems to have this McCain mentality of "I've been trying to get here for years.  It's my turn.  I deserve this."

I've heard that from some of his supporters too - that Santorum can wait but this is Newt's last chance.

Didn't we do this with Dole? Electing somebody because 'it's their turn', is the worst rationale ever.

Technically - it's Romney's turn, being the best candidate not to win an election since he lost to McCain. Newt's not even next in line for anything - since this is his first and only so far election campaign.

That's great voter turnout!

Why do you have a democrat avatar???

For the Republican caucuses, yes.  In general, not really.

I'm glad Washington finally had a say in the GOP nomination. Four years ago everything was well over by the time they voted.

The story was third on NBC, with the focus on Ohio.  Santorum got a break there.

The 5th Legislative District GOP (my district) actually posted their results:

53% Romney (843)
17% Paul (263)
15% Santorum (246)
12% Gingrich (195)
3% Others (42)