We're going to be fully staffed tonight for the primary election. Which means we may have more people working in the office than voters who actually cast a ballot.
According to the latest Field Poll, just 35 percent of the 17 million Californians who are registered in today's election are projected to actually turn out and vote. If that forecast holds true, total turnout would fall below the previous modern low of 42 percent in 1996, another year in which a sitting Democratic president was running unchallenged and the Republican front-runner had the nomination pretty well in hand.
"When you strip away voters in a low turnout election, you're mostly taking away younger voters, ethnic voters, even some middle age voters," Field Poll director Mark DiCamillo told The California Report's Scott Shafer yesterday. "What's left is people who tend to vote no matter what. We think in this election that 60 percent of the ballot will be cast by voters age 50 and older. That's very different than the overall population of California."
Jeez. Someone needs to start handing out lollipops. If you do happen to be one of the civic-minded elite who plans on voting, remember: at this point, don't drop your absentee ballot in the mailbox. That ship has sailed, yo -- you have to turn it in at your polling place by 8 p.m. in order for your vote to be counted.
As for what's at stake, AP puts it this way:
Tuesday's primary election is shaping the battleground races that will decide if Democrats can win two-thirds majorities in the California Assembly and Senate, the threshold needed to approve tax increases without Republican support.
All but 20 of the Legislature's 120 seats are up for election this year, and all current lawmakers are running in newly drawn districts under California's new top-two primary system.
The primary system approved by voters in 2010 lets only the top two vote-getters advance to the November general election, even if they are from the same political party. That is expected to force nearly two-dozen same-party candidates to compete against each other in the fall. The prize for Senate and Assembly Democrats would be super majorities if each can pick up two more seats this year.
The other thing affecting the dynamics of many races: the recent redistricting process, in which new districts were drawn by a citizen's commission and not by one of the political parties.