Who were the Gore-Bush voters?

[Pres Mike]

In 2000, Bush got 47.9% of the vote. Gore got 48.4%. Nader got 2.74%

In 2004, Bush got 50.7% of the vote. Kerry got 48.3%. Nader got 0.38%

It seems Kerry was able to get most of the Nader 2000 vote. But it seems 2.46% of voters switched from Gore 2000 to Bush 2004

So what happened? Natioanl secuirty voters? Perhaps they were going to vote for Bush in 2000 before the DUI?

Or perhaps Republicans just had more untapped first time voters?

[Pres Mike]

White suburban women, also a decent chunk of rural voters in places like the upper south. With the former group it was primarily terrorism, they were specifically targeted with the "Wolves" ad for example. With the latter group it was terrorism along with gay marriage.

I see, soccer moms who wanted to feel "safe".

The second group were conservative leaning southerns in TN, WV and KY. They finally found home in the GOP after giving Democrats one last chance with Bill Clinton.

[Pres Mike]

Neocons who didn't care for the domestic policy Bush ran on in 2000, neocons who thought Gore was more neocon than Bush in 2000, people frightened by 9/11, 9/11 first responders, etc.

Wasn't Bush seen as unusually liberal for a Republican in 2000?

[Pres Mike]

Hispanics, southerners, and people with family ties to New York.

Having looked at the data, Bush improved best in the upper south, Arizona and tri-state area (NY/NJ/CT) so you are right.

Bush also improved a few points in Texas, California, Florida and Illinois. All big states that helped with the national popular vote margin.

Looking at the swing states, he only gained a point or two. But this was cancelled out by Kerry eating up the Nader vote. So Kerry kept WI/MI/PA/MN with similar margins.

Something interesting, Kerry did much better than Gore in the Mountain West. That can be explained with Nader doing quite well in 2000. Nader won 5% in Montana and 10% in Alaska! Kerry was able to do much better than Gore in states like MT/AK/ID/SD but still lost these states. I think these states are more secular so the gay marriage refrendums wouldn't have flipped too many voters unlike the south. Might also explain why the Obama 2008 campaign thought they were slightly winnable.