10 September 2016
Latest registered voter numbers for Montana suggest
November’s turnout may be smaller than in 2012
Just over 5,400 new voters were registered during the last 30 days, bringing Montana’s total to 663,043. That’s 18,565 fewer than on election day in 2012. Much of the decline is in counties carried by Steve Bullock in 2012.
Nevertheless, my back-of-the-envelope calculations indicate that if Bullock receives in each county the percentage of the registered voters who voted for him in 2012, and Greg Gianforte reprises Rick Hill’s percentages, Bullock will win by just under 5,000 votes. Take that with a pound, not just a grain, of salt.
Below, I’ve plotted the change from 2012 as a function of the number of registered voters in 2016.
Voter registration numbers are notoriously variable. After each election, elections administrators remove the deadwood from the registration rolls, after which new voters are registered through a variety of mechanisms and the rolls grow again.
Regular voter registration ends on 11 October. Late registration begins the same day. Thus, it’s possible that at the end of 8 November, there will be as many registered voters in Montana as there were four years earlier. But for that to happen, the current rate of new registrations must double.
I favor automatically registering voters once they reach 18 years of age and do not belong to an excluded class, such as felons still in the slammer.